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I just started a mono Nurgle army and I was trying to bone up on the rules for the chaos demons and I was looking for some clarity. I have a fairly psyker heavy army basically all of it being princes, GUO, heralds, etc...

The question I have is can any of these ever have psychic focus in anything but the plague discipline? As they all automatically get the primaris power for plague being nurgle, so even if I took all their choices for powers from one of the other disciplines doesn't that lose them the ability to automatically get the focus for that discipline? Or am I misunderstanding the rules here?

They cannot gain psychic focus as they know a power from the plague discipline. You can still swap any power rolled for that discipline's primaris however.

That is what I figured. Thanks for the clarification.

There is a RAW argument that means your psykers would still be eligible for psychic focus, as the Chaos Focus power is automatically known rather than counting as a generated power.

As long as the powers you GENERATED were all from the same discipline, a chaos psyker can get psychic focus as well as know his god's primaris. Really this only gives you more options of spells to cast. You're still going to end up being quite limited by warp charge.

They know their god's primaris "in addition to all other powers they know." I see it as the immortal psyker simply knows his god's primaris for eternity (he is an eternal devotee of the god's psychic presence after all) and can call upon it at all times unless it's taken from him by perils or an enemy spell.

This is how i see the RAW, and my group fully accepts it as well after some deliberation. That's only the viewpoint of about 7 people though.

You immediately lose the Primaris from Psychic Focus if you ever have a spell from another Discipline:

“If during the course of the game, that Psyker gains a psychic power from a different psychic discipline, he immediately loses Psychic Focus (and the associated primaris power).”

When you gain Chaos Psychic Focus you lose regular Psychic Focus.

You dont "gain" chaos psychic focus during the course of the game. You automatically know the primaris in addition to any other powers you know. This is a continuous effect on the model, not something that was gained. Normal psychic focus however, must be gained by generating powers, thus is denied when a power is generated from a seperate discipline. The chaos primaris was never, ever generated, it was automatically known in addition to your other powers. This also deals with losing the focus due to generating on other tables, because the chaos primaris was never generated at all.

You still lose psychic focus though as soon as you take a god specific power, because that is generated from a different discipline to any of the basic ones.

If you are a Nurgle Daemon Prince mastery level 3- say you roll all three powers on Biomancy- you have those 3 powers and the biomancy primaris... In addition to that, you have the Nurgle primaris because all Nurgle daemon Psykers automatically have that. You only would lose the Biomancy primaris if you rolled to generate the power from another discipline. The Nurgle Primaris power is not generated- every Nurgle daemon psyker auto knows it. Just like all daemonic psykers for Tzeentch and Slannesh as well.
Now, if you are playing a daemon Prince from the CSM codex, you are forced to generate 1 Nurgle power in addition to the primaris, so you are not eligible for any other free primaris powers.

KhorneontheCobb, I wholeheartedly agree. You do not gain the chaos primaris, you always know it. Psychic focus is only lost from powers gained that belong to a different discipline. Roknar, close inspection of the rules will show you the focus is lost upon gaining a power, not automatically knowing one.

Yes, and as KhorneontheCobb also said, if you take a power from any 2 disciplines you will loose you psychic focus.
And rolling on the god specific discipline counts as gaining a power, which is why a csm marked sorcerer can't ever benefit from psychic focus at all. You would have to be unmarked for that,in which case the csm sorcerer or daemon prince wouldn't get the god specific power.

But for daemons you can roll all biomancy and still have the primaris from two disciplines.

Where does it say the power from the second discipline has to be rolled or generated at the start of the game?

Oh! Yes of course, for csm they can't get psychic focus. I was arguing purely for psykers from codex: chaos daemons. Apologies roknar, i didnt realize we were in agreeance. Haha.

Np lol, I did kind of sneak in csm after all
Since they share the chaos psychic focus with daemons and they often ally together. Probably should have been more specific ^^


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 jokerkd wrote:
Where does it say the power from the second discipline has to be rolled or generated at the start of the game?

page 22 Psychic focus

It only talks about generating powers. But with Chaos psyhic Focus you never generate the primaris. You simply know the power.
You would also loose psychic focus if you gain psychic powers later, like from the scrolls of magnus relic in csm. So it's not exclusive to the beginning of the game.

I was just wondering if there was actually any mention of the power having to be "rolled" or "generated" as has been claimed.

I appreciate the argument that the chaos primaris is never actually gained. I disagree, but at least you're argument is actually based on the written rules

Two questions.

How does one generate Psychic Powers?
When does the game "start"?

Once we have a conclusive answer to both, it is easy to determine whether or not a model can benefit from both Psychic Focus and Daemonic Focus.

A power is generated by rolling a dice on a table of powers you have access to. This is never done for a chaos psyker in regards to chaos psychic focus. You dont generate powers you already know.

The game doesnt start the moment you write a mastery level into your list, which is when he gains his primaris power from chaos psychic focus. He automatically knows it. It's like an added piece of wargear that comes with the mastery level. As soon as he is a psyker he automatically knows his god's primaris in addition to any others he knows. Even if you pick a definite moment when the game started, how can you use that to determine if he gets psychic focus? It already states a power must bs generated in order to subvert psychic focus. Was that criteria met when you automatically knew your god's primaris before the start of the game?

The primaris power is an inherent characteristic of a chaos psyker who is a patron of a god. Of course fluff should never be used for rules arguments, but why would he forget it at the end of every game and begin to know it at the start of the next one? When you write a meltagun into your list, you dont say "i generate a meltagun with this tac marine at the start of the game." he was carrying it before he ever got to this battle scene.

How does one generate Psychic Powers?

Either randomly or automatically

When does the game "start"?

Psychic powers must be generated before the game starts. Though, under "generating psychic powers" it states that models with powers on their datasheet start the game with those powers.

The fact that a model automatically knows a power does not mean that the model should be considered to have known it before the generating step. Especially when the closest other instance states only that you start the game with that power


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AncientSkarbrand wrote:
A power is generated by rolling a dice on a table of powers you have access to. This is never done for a chaos psyker in regards to chaos psychic focus. You dont generate powers you already know.

The game doesnt start the moment you write a mastery level into your list, which is when he gains his primaris power from chaos psychic focus. He automatically knows it. It's like an added piece of wargear that comes with the mastery level. As soon as he is a psyker he automatically knows his god's primaris in addition to any others he knows. Even if you pick a definite moment when the game started, how can you use that to determine if he gets psychic focus? It already states a power must bs generated in order to subvert psychic focus. Was that criteria met when you automatically knew your god's primaris before the start of the game?

The primaris power is an inherent characteristic of a chaos psyker who is a patron of a god. Of course fluff should never be used for rules arguments, but why would he forget it at the end of every game and begin to know it at the start of the next one? When you write a meltagun into your list, you dont say "i generate a meltagun with this tac marine at the start of the game." he was carrying it before he ever got to this battle scene.

All assumptions with not one rules reference

It doesnt state automatically generates. It says automatically knows.

This is a tired old arguement. Lots of people play it both ways. I've already read threads on it and seen rules references involving it. It's still the same arguement.

Do you generate something you already know? I really, really think not. Nor do i see any rules references for you stating that powers can be "generated automatically".


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Even if he didnt know it before the generating step... He didnt generate the power in question. He automatically knew it.

AncientSkarbrand wrote:
It doesnt state automatically generates. It says automatically knows.

This is a tired old arguement. Lots of people play it both ways. I've already read threads on it and seen rules references involving it. It's still the same arguement.

Do you generate something you already know? I really, really think not. Nor do i see any rules references for you stating that powers can be "generated automatically".


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Even if he didnt know it before the generating step... He didnt generate the power in question. He automatically knew it.

Please note that the following is inferred from a single FAQ. Tyranids.

The Amendment section adds the following to the Primaris power (Dominion): "If the Psyker does not have the Synapse Creature special rule, it gains it for the duration of this power and has a Synapse range of 6"."

There is only a single model in the Tyranid codex that is a Psyker but not a Synapse Creature - the Broodlord.

Broodlords automatically know The Horror. They do not roll for powers. As such, it is logical that the change to Dominion is meant to apply to Broodlords. Since Broodlords know their power and don't "generate" it, it seems to me that knowing=generating.

The rulebook also states that all a psykers powers must be generated. Paraphrased a bit probably. Its in the first few paragraphs of the psychic phase rules.

If all powers must be generated, then to know any power, it must have been generated.

Also...... "automatically knows" =/= "already knows"

Happyjew, Im not familiar enough with tyranids to know how that might be relevant to the discussion cause i dont know their psychic powers or the broodlord's rules. Sorry for my ignorance.


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Knows also does not equal generate...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Hold on, so you're saying that because the broodlord automatically knows the horror psychic power, and because he's the only psyking nonsynapse creature in the codex, that it equals generating a power for automatically knowing the horror?

I understand. It is an instance where GW treats "knows" and "generates" as virtually very similar. In almost all circumstances, it states "If a psyker generates all of their powers..." when talking about psychic focus, and that causes the inference that the horror which is automatically known counts as a generated power if he is meant to gain psychic focus as the faq suggests.

However, under "Generating Psychic Powers" in the rulebook it says: "Psykers generate their powers before the game begins. This is done openly, so both you and your opponent are aware of the powers each psyker has generated. If you have more than one psyker, you may choose the order in which you generate their powers.

In some army list entries, A psyker will have one or more specific powers listed - where this is the case, it will be clearly stated. These psykers always start the game with these psychic powers. Otherwise, a psyker generates his remaining powers from amongst the disciplines known to him"

And then it goes on about needing to roll a dice to randomly generate a psychic power. I believe that in the case of the broodlord, which is actually really interesting, He started the game forced to know "The horror" and since it is a spell of the tyranid discipline he gains psychic focus and must gain the primaris spell from amongst the disciplines known to him, which is Powers of the Hive Mind. This does not mean he gained, or generated "the horror".

Honestly I'm Inclined to believe they just wanted to give him dominion as well as the horror, but wanted to restrict him to the horror rather than let him generate randomly when they wrote the codex and later faq'd that he gained psychic focus to make the model more useful. It seems more like the intent was to restrict him to one of the discipline's powers as well as psychic focus rather than imply that automatically knowing = generating.

Really interesting counterpoint though.. I definitely feel a little less certain. If it was a common occurrence and not just in a faq for a codex that was released long before 7th and space hulk, It would have more credibility as revealing the RAI, in my mind.

Eh, you can see where trying to nab a primaris from another tree goes. It makes arguments. I have found it is much easier to run my mono nurgle daemons as using nurgle primaris, and I don't get the other free primaris if I roll all biomancy or something.


Mono nurgle armies are a blast! Get some plague drones!

My group hasnt seen it as trying to nab anything. They unanimously agreed after looking at the relevant rules. Really dont feel i'm trying to gain an unfair advantage here. The only game changing primaris' are psychic shreik and prescience and it's not like you get to cast them for free. It's just another tool in the toolkit. Another blade for the swiss army knife.

Point is, everyone i play against has had zero problem with it and it hasnt affected the power of my lists. I can still only reliably cast 3 or 4 important powers a turn anyways. Everyone including myself doesnt feel like i'm trying anything underhanded at all. It's when you come onto the forums that you meet such strong opposition because nobody knows or cares about you and sees you as some dick trying to gain an unfair advantage. Other psykers get crazy bonuses like a librarius conclave or seer council.. Is it really that big of a deal that a daemon psyker can know one not very important power more than other psykers?for what its worth i would trade chaos focus and its bonus for casting on a 3 anyday.

Anyways it all boils down to if you think knows = generate or not. If you do, they dont get it. If you dont, they do. It hardly makes much of a difference anyways.

What? And let us chaos be one step closer to the exclusive IoM club?....wat are u? Heretic?

This has a lot of information in it:


http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/619281.page

And this one does as well.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/600926.page

For what it's worth i've always thought of it like this:

Until you start to generate powers for the Psyker, they don't have any powers. Once you start to generate you do the following;
1- check for any pre-determined powers
2- Check for chaos mark/deamon
3- Check the tables they HAVE to roll on
4- Check the tables they can roll on
5- Check for psychic focus.
6- Check for Force

(obviously 3 & 4 you generate until you cant know any more powers)
All of these steps fall under the "Generating Psychic Powers" Section of the rule book.
Until you get to the generating powers section, Psykers know no powers, then you generate what they know based on the above ie a combination of rules and rolling.

Although, I dont mind either way if they get both or not, cause you still need the warp dice to cast all this stuff.