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@FezzikDaBullgryn I would argue your point about subterfuge having no place in 40k simply because there are psykers. First of the whole point of removing a threat through assasinations is to preserve the infrastructure. The Imperium does care about its tithes. The damage caused by lancing something from orbit would take years to reconstruct. Of course after something has gone poorly there’s rarely any choice other then to annihilate the threat and in the worst case exterminatus it. To keep the Imperiums economy floating inquisitors have the tools to provide a quick end to a threat before it manifests fully.

As for why psykers aren’t always used, they actually are. It’s rare to find an inquisitor who either isn’t a psyker or who doesn’t have a psyker in their retinue. If a threat can be dealt with directly then yeah, problem solved. Deploy psyker, mind crush, done. It’s rarely so simple though. A psyker commonly makes for a very poor solo operative. Mostly because the moment a psychic mishap happens the cover is blown. In the case that a threat can not be handled directly, deploying a agent that specializes in subterfuge makes perfect sense. This is an organization that routinely deploys grey knights, death watch and the sorotitas. If forces are needed they can certainly be provided. But then why would you waste valuable military resources when a single solo operative specialized for this task can get the job done? Those ships and armies can be off fighting something else. If an assassin fails then yeah, call in the big guns. But then you are just pretty much in the same situation as if the assassin hadn’t been deployed in the first place. If the assassin succeeds great. More resources for the imperium, armies can be used elsewhere, infrastructure remain intact. Don’t think of assassins as a money sink. Think if them as a money saver for other military resources.

As to facing opposing ridiculously strong psykers there’s actually canonical non-culexus ways to deal with it. An example strategy is to through various methods remove an assassins memories. Only having it be activated by very specific stimuli, like maybe the smell of the targets perfume. That way not even a mind reader would be aware they’ve been infiltrated. There’s also null field technology, making you practically invisible to psykers. Of course there’s other methods based on the psyker in question but you probably get the idea. Magic isn’t a fix it all invincible ability.

We are also forgetting an even more potent and less expensive weapon than all of these.

Politics and Threats, implied or otherwise.

In the Book Shadowsword, the Administratum guy who comes to the planet to demand the Imperial Tithe makes a very solemn but effective oath. Reject the Imperial law, accept your fate. That threat alone is far more useful in dissuading dissent than more, colorful methods. Within a single year, the Imperium has begun moving an entire Division to the planet, and destroys most of it.

It's almost like the Mafia.

'Ey, dis is a nice planet you gots here. Be a shame if something happened to it.

And what do you do when the planet says no? You don't invade because then you turn the population against you. You assassinate the governor and replace them with someone more compliant.

 Gert wrote:
And what do you do when the planet says no? You don't invade because then you turn the population against you. You assassinate the governor and replace them with someone more compliant.

Sure because the rogue governor decided to contradict the IOM alone he didnt have any internal or external support.

Killing regional leaders through stealth assasins without futher explanation seems a very viable tactic to achieve compliance.

Vatsetis wrote:
Sure because the rogue governor decided to contradict the IOM alone he didnt have any internal or external support.

Killing regional leaders through stealth assasins without futher explanation seems a very viable tactic to achieve compliance.

There doesn't need to be a further explanation if the Governor gets shot while giving a speech about not paying the tithe by an unseen gunman, or poisoned at a gathering of their allies and the Administratum shows up a couple of days later to install a new leader. Those who allied themselves with the Governor will already be afraid that it was the Imperium that killed their leader for daring to break their oath.
Fear works and assassins are still absolutely a valid and useful tool in the Imperial arsenal.
And as has been mentioned like 10 times already, it's not just rogue Imperials that assassins are used against, a point that conveniently keeps getting ignored.

The other benefit of the assassin organisations is that an inquisitor doesn’t have to micromanage the process. They make the decision and then the responsibility for implementation can be passed over and the inquisitor (or whoever) can go on with dealing with the next thing with a reasonable expectation that the offending person will not be offending (or personing) for much longer. It’s all about delegation

Feel like this has gone off topic slightly

mrFickle wrote:
Feel like this has gone off topic slightly

True, but to be fair, the initial topic was basically answered with, "The fluff is inconsistent, but yes; assassins can potentially win a cage match against a marine."

To be fair, I made some very off topic and dumb statements, but in my defense, someone included DPs in the list of targets an Assassin COULD take down.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

I mean, he's the only living psker to contest the hive mind correct? Not only that, but he literally stops the DP Karbander from escaping his prison, he withstands psychic tests that literally cause all the other librarians' heads to explode, most chapters regard him as the most powerful librarian in the Astartes, he's spoken with the dead spirit of a Primarch, I mean, his list of psychic feats is almost as great as Dante's list of martial feats.

Yeah, he's top 10 among humans.

But he's still not as strong as some others....

Eisenhorne, Ravenor, Voke, Heldane, Malcador, any GK (not sure where they rank), etc.

Not sure where or how to rank Psykers but I know Mephy is up there near the top of humanity.

So much of what you said is wrong it's unreal.

Not only are you confusing Mephiston and Tigurius, but the idea that Eisenhorn is a better psyker than anyone is hilarious. It's actually an in-joke with a buddy of mine that every psyker Eisenhorn encounters is the most powerful psyker he's ever encountered because he's claimed as such multiple times and is universally the underdog any time he encounters another psyker.

Ahriman is also incidentally likely more powerful than any Imperial psyker around, able to force Yvraine (herself an incredibly powerful psyker) and her cohort (including the fething Yncarne) into a subsection of the Webway he sectioned off where she was helpless to stop him, and had to bargain with him to get him to release her by showing she knew how to reverse the Rubric (before backstabbing him of course).

Could you also say that any psyker is sufficiently powerful for the narrative and the author's intent, and there is no real scale? Like, at some point raw power has to give way to skill. For instance, Meph might be stupidly powerful in Darkness in the Blood, but can he do extremely subtle things with his power? Or does he just rely on brute force? Is there any evaluation to skill vs power?

And no, Mephiston is not confused with Tiggy in that quote. Go read Devestation of Baal. He and the other librarians lock themselves in the cave of psyker rocks or whatever, and have a psyker fight with Karbander.

I was absolutely wrong about him contacting the Hive Mind. I admit that.

A fight they lose and one that kills multiple Librarians. And that's all of the Blood Angles and their Successors Librarians BTW, not just like 5 dudes in a cave.

 Gert wrote:
A fight they lose and one that kills multiple Librarians. And that's all of the Blood Angles and their Successors Librarians BTW, not just like 5 dudes in a cave.

Exactly. Mephiston might be fairly strong physically, but not psychically.

No, Mephiston absolutely is a top-tier human(ish) Psyker. But using psychic powers to take on the Daemon that broke his Primarch and has an eternal animosity towards the Blood Angels lineage that also happens to be aligned with the God that really hates sorcery was a really bad plan.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Could you also say that any psyker is sufficiently powerful for the narrative and the author's intent, and there is no real scale? Like, at some point raw power has to give way to skill. For instance, Meph might be stupidly powerful in Darkness in the Blood, but can he do extremely subtle things with his power? Or does he just rely on brute force? Is there any evaluation to skill vs power?

And no, Mephiston is not confused with Tiggy in that quote. Go read Devestation of Baal. He and the other librarians lock themselves in the cave of psyker rocks or whatever, and have a psyker fight with Karbander.

I was absolutely wrong about him contacting the Hive Mind. I admit that.

Yes, skill is definitely a huge part of it. I would actually say that it is the biggest part.

From what I have seen, Psykers kind almost start at full power. It's learning how to control that power that makes the difference between a lower and higher level psyker.

Psychic powers are definitely more in the soft-fantasy realm is terms of how well defined they are. More "A wizard did it" than something a little more concrete and substantial.

 Nerak wrote:

 Mr_Rose wrote:
each new Assassin is a project unto themselves with potentially experimental tweaks at the whim of the Temple.

This can get kind of absurd. Like that time a Callidus was modified with extra arms, along the polymorph, to take the place of a purestrain geenestealer. It had something to do with infiltrating and taking over a gene stealer cult. It’s very silly but also kind of awesome.

I want to read about this, do you know where it's from?

For the sake of your sanity and soul, don't.

Och, its fine.

Meh’lindi, from the very old Inquisition War series with Inquisitor Draco. As with most 40k characters, a bit of a tragic figure.

https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Meh%27Lindi

https://warhammer40k.fandom.com/wiki/Jaq_Draco

 Insectum7 wrote:


As 40K lacks granularity I'd be interested to see what the Inquisition game, or the RPG has to say about them. But 40K wise, the Assassin is another "transhuman" and one that's always had FAR superior stats than your average marine.

The RPGs Dark Heresy and Deathwatch had the option of player character Vindicere Assassin and Space Marine respectively.

Obviously they had a whole career path so it's not easy to compare directly but yeah: a space marine's S and T bonuses are much higher. The Assassin has a massively higher Ag (agility) and dodge skill and the Temple Assassin trait that lets them evade normally undodgeable attacjs so actually hitting them is nigh impossible.


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From what I have seen, Psykers kind almost start at full power. It's learning how to control that power that makes the difference between a lower and higher level psyker

Not true - psykers do have a wildly varying level of power. There is a recognised 'scale' of psyker potention, given in the RPGs, ranging from Alpha Plus (massive psy potential but humans rarely stay sane - this is Magnus level) to Omega Minus (a pariah not able to survive outside life support).

Ravenous is Gamma, Eisenhorn low Delta.

Remember that this doesn't include 'unnatural' (if that's the right word!) Enhancement like demonic sorcery, runes, psibooster tech, etc.

Ahriman would *probably* be alpha without the helm of amon, black staff and assorted pacts, grimoires and so on but with them he's into "what happened to physics?" levels.

Was the thing with "Mother gullet" a canonized work, or just a passing reference in a codex? I mean, their ability is demonstrated in several books, it's almost inhuman. But I don't want to start another tangent.

locarno24 wrote:

Grey Templar wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Could you also say that any psyker is sufficiently powerful for the narrative and the author's intent, and there is no real scale? Like, at some point raw power has to give way to skill. For instance, Meph might be stupidly powerful in Darkness in the Blood, but can he do extremely subtle things with his power? Or does he just rely on brute force? Is there any evaluation to skill vs power?

From what I have seen, Psykers kind almost start at full power. It's learning how to control that power that makes the difference between a lower and higher level psyker.

Psychic powers are definitely more in the soft-fantasy realm is terms of how well defined they are. More "A wizard did it" than something a little more concrete and substantial.

Not true - psykers do have a wildly varying level of power. There is a recognised 'scale' of psyker potention, given in the RPGs, ranging from Alpha Plus (massive psy potential but humans rarely stay sane - this is Magnus level) to Omega Minus (a pariah not able to survive outside life support).

Pretty sure that’s not what Grey meant; I believe the idea was that, whatever potential the psyker has, they have it from the moment they Awaken. Psykers don’t so much “level up” in terms of the raw power they can fling about but increase in skill and control. That is, a Delta will always be a Delta but can go from throwing raw warp energy around like a flamethrower to much more focused and controlled mind-bullets. Kinda like sticking your thumb over a hosepipe without changing the tap.

In fact I’m pretty sure that psykers who actually increase their power potential are incredibly suspicious to the inquisition because that is one of the primary signs of Sorcery. Which is why Eisenhorn got investigated after he picked up that nifty Blackstone staff of his - while he’s holding it he’s actually a mid-gamma level.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:Was the thing with "Mother gullet" a canonized work, or just a passing reference in a codex? I mean, their ability is demonstrated in several books, it's almost inhuman. But I don't want to start another tangent.

I’ve only seen the original story in the codex and it’s actually quite short.

Exactly. A psyker always has the full potential of their abilities. IE: Training cannot make them more powerful than they actually are. It can only make what they have more useful and/or more controlled.

Its not like other magic systems where you start off and can fling little electric sparks, but nothing more dangerous than that till you "level up" and gain more power. Instead, you start with the power to fry and whole city. But over time you learn to control it in more precise ways so you can destroy specific targets instead of whole cities, because collateral damage is bad.

This is also why a psyker awakening out in "the wild" is incredibly bad in the Imperium. Someone who suddenly has so much power they have no idea how to control inevitably leads to a lot of damage and destruction, and likely daemonic possession of the psyker's untrained mind. You need to find these guys before they awaken so they can be taken to Terra to be trained and soulbound to the Emperor, or sacrificed if they are too weak to be of use.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Exactly. A psyker always has the full potential of their abilities. IE: Training cannot make them more powerful than they actually are. It can only make what they have more useful and/or more controlled.

Its not like other magic systems where you start off and can fling little electric sparks, but nothing more dangerous than that till you "level up" and gain more power. Instead, you start with the power to fry and whole city. But over time you learn to control it in more precise ways so you can destroy specific targets instead of whole cities, because collateral damage is bad.

This is also why a psyker awakening out in "the wild" is incredibly bad in the Imperium. Someone who suddenly has so much power they have no idea how to control inevitably leads to a lot of damage and destruction, and likely daemonic possession of the psyker's untrained mind. You need to find these guys before they awaken so they can be taken to Terra to be trained and soulbound to the Emperor, or sacrificed if they are too weak to be of use.

From an holistic POV every human (not only 40k psykers) starts at full potential and only trains to use and control such potential in an efficient manner.

The film Gattaca explains this in a masterfull manner.

Destiny and Free Will are just a matter of perspective.

But then GW or BL can always introduce a Mcguffin that "Exponentially magnifies the power" of a psyker, for instance, Eisenhorns special rod, or Ravenor's Chair, or a Librarian's Hood.

Yes, psykers are always at full power, but GW can write around that. All it takes is one short story where an old hermit touches the head of a young psyker, and hey presto, POTENTIAL UNLOCKED! The young boy is now the ALPHA Psyker, or some stupid nonsense.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I thought one of the big rules of Background is that we don't bring table top into fluff discussions. As such, all in game rules and stats are pointless. They don't indicate what a unit is truly able to do, or not do. A Calladius CAN kill Dante, or Jain Zar and Asurmen, Drazhar, and even Trajaan Valoris. Is anyone here really going to argue that Trajaan and Drazhar are not as good at fighting as one of them?

Keeping stats out of a fluff discussion is not something that I'm going to honor. Stats are a another set of data points in terms of judging relative capabilities, especially when relative stats have a measure of consistency (for decades in this case). Also, remembering that (especially in the old days) the game designers themselves were the drivers of the universe creation. Like, I'm going to take the opinion of Andy Chambers or Rick Priestly a lot more seriously than some hack writer writing a BL novel years later. Plus you yourself have already maintained that the narratives in BL aren't exactly consistent either. So if there's a measure of consistency in game stats and rules interactions, and there isn't in the novels, then stats look like a good thing to go by.

Additionally, it's important to recall that narratives are often not going by the "average" sort of scenario, but the extraordinary ones. A lot of the time even those extraordinary scenarios can be played out in a game using the rules and stats, it's just that the author essentially gets to pick what numbers come up on the dice.

The thing is, throughout the editions, Assassins have consistently held stats roughly on par with Space Marine Captains. Sometimes fewer wounds, (sometimes more), and always trending as faster.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
To be fair, I made some very off topic and dumb statements, but in my defense, someone included DPs in the list of targets an Assassin COULD take down.

If you're referring to my quote I specifically said that a Daemon Prince was on the list of things that would beat an Assassin.

Edit: Buuuuuuuut . . . A Culexus Assassin is specifically crippling to psykers, and many Daemon Princes are psykers. I think how that relationship manifests tends to vary, but it's important to keep in mind.

locarno24 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

As 40K lacks granularity I'd be interested to see what the Inquisition game, or the RPG has to say about them. But 40K wise, the Assassin is another "transhuman" and one that's always had FAR superior stats than your average marine.

The RPGs Dark Heresy and Deathwatch had the option of player character Vindicere Assassin and Space Marine respectively.

Obviously they had a whole career path so it's not easy to compare directly but yeah: a space marine's S and T bonuses are much higher. The Assassin has a massively higher Ag (agility) and dodge skill and the Temple Assassin trait that lets them evade normally undodgeable attacjs so actually hitting them is nigh impossible.

^That's interesting info, thanks for posting that.

Yeah there's not just the basic stats comparisons but also how they interact within the game mechanics. As you say the Space Marine might be stronger and tougher in that system (40Ks not known for granularity), but if the Assassin is using the mechanics of that system to just not get hit in the first place, that's another good data point.

Eversors do not explode as a last ditch attempt to finish the mission, they explode as the massive cocktails of chemicals in their body no longer has the functioning organs of the body keeping it from self detonating. If that were the case they could choose to explode, they would give all assassins the option.

Assassins were mega strong on the tabletop and in the lore back in second edition. The Callidus actually defeated Konrad Curze back then... They have been toned down somewhat in the lore since then.

I thought the Curze thing was slightly more nuanced than "He lost."

Ala, Guilliman beat up Mortarion, but GMan is NOT stronger than Mortarion. Mortarion was fighting both Gman, and the Emperor literally manifesting inside Gman.

In any event, every fluff fight 1v1 in 40k has a big fat asterisk next to it.

Curze knew that the assassin was coming and allowed her to kill him because he already knew she would due to his prescience

Not sure what the 2nd Ed stuff was but for as long as I've been about in 40k, Curze did do a little fight with M'shen but then let himself be killed to prove his system of punishing those who did bad things was justified. His death punished him for the acts he committed as commander of the 8th Legion during the Crusade and Heresy. Curze's philosophy that so many within the Imperium decried as barbaric was vindicated when the Imperium did it to him.

Assassins are incredibly powerful. I would wage that an assassin could go toe to toe with a custode and be evenly matched.

In the book Nemisis an evesor assassin was killing space marines pretty effortlessly, and ended up killing several dozen before he suicide bombed a bunch of them.

Caldus and celuxus are the same.