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So a major complaint in a lot of places about the psychic phase in general is the sheer amount of rolls a witchfire has to go through in order to do anything at all and there are a good number of psyker units that rely on their psyker powers to shoot.

Is there a reason why it would be unbalancing to have witchfires cause a number of hits instead of a number of shots?

A gun can just shoot, roll to hit, roll to wound, save done.

A witchfire currently has manifest, deny, hit, wound, save.

I don't see why it would be anything but more balanced to have witchfires just hit their target unit but maybe there are powers I am unfamiliar with. What does everyone think? If there are reasons why this would be a really bad idea please let me know.

REMOVE RANDOMNESS FROM MY 40K?

NEVAR!!?!?!1!

Lance845 wrote:
So a major complaint in a lot of places about the psychic phase in general is the sheer amount of rolls a witchfire has to go through in order to do anything at all and there are a good number of psyker units that rely on their psyker powers to shoot.

Is there a reason why it would be unbalancing to have witchfires cause a number of hits instead of a number of shots?

A gun can just shoot, roll to hit, roll to wound, save done.

A witchfire currently has manifest, deny, hit, wound, save.

I don't see why it would be anything but more balanced to have witchfires just hit their target unit but maybe there are powers I am unfamiliar with. What does everyone think? If there are reasons why this would be a really bad idea please let me know.

I'm of a split mind on this. On one hand, it really stinks to go through the trouble of investing warp dice into casting the power (and possibly perils'ing for your trouble) only to miss with your one-shot psychic power. On the other hand, powers like the flickering fire of Tzeentch (or whatever it's called) put out a rather high volume of shots, and the BS of the caster dramatically changes how useful those powers are. My roughly-formed suggestions are as follows:

*Leave psychic powers with a to-hit roll as they are; It's really not that much more rolling if you only cast a couple witchfires a turn.
*Armies that depend on tons of witchfires (mostly thinking of Tzeentch armies here) should probably just have normal shooting attacks that can be optionally augmented by a psychic power (or something similar to one). So Flickering Flames might be a "gun" given to all Tzeentch daemons that is Assault 1. Then, give all Tzeentch daemons access to the "Enhance Flames" psychic power that lets them increase the number of shots Flickering Flames has by 1 for every success they roll, for instance.
*Some witchfire powers should probably be redesigned to be beams or blasts or to simply auto-hit.

Use nova instead.

Personally I've never noticed. it's only one roll more than with a shooting attack, and there's usually a lot less actions to do in the psychic phase than the shooting phase. Also this would make Eldar even more OP.

Taffy17 wrote:
Personally I've never noticed. it's only one roll more than with a shooting attack, and there's usually a lot less actions to do in the psychic phase than the shooting phase. Also this would make Eldar even more OP.

Good point. Daemons don't generally have to roll much in the shooting phase except to shoot soul grinder and ru-Wait. What was that about eldar? If memory serves, two of the four eldar-specific witchfires are either blasts or templates. Of the other two, one is basically purge soul with a higher WC, and the other is only able to kill 3 models max with a series of AP- attacks. In either case, you would only be rolling to hit a single time with BS 5, so you're only failing to hit with those powers once every six times you cast them anyway. The only other witchfire they have access to outside of daemonology that I can think of is psychic scream which is good, but definitely not unique to eldar. And again, you'd only be missing with it 1 out of 6 times anyway (less if you're guided or something).

Respectfully, sir or madame, I'm not sure this change would have a terribly large impact upon eldar psychic offense. I mean, it would make them more OP in the same sense that making storm guardian chainswords Ap6 would make them more OP. It's technically an improvement, but hardly the most dramatic effect the suggested change would have.

Have Witchfires not be Deny-able. I mean most of them are manifesting something and then hurling it (Flickering Fire of Tzeentch) so how are you "willing away" something that is already here?

Armor/Invulns already exist, we dont need no add Deny the Witch to defense rolls for sup par shooting.

 Grimmor wrote:
Have Witchfires not be Deny-able. I mean most of them are manifesting something and then hurling it (Flickering Fire of Tzeentch) so how are you "willing away" something that is already here?

Armor/Invulns already exist, we dont need no add Deny the Witch to defense rolls for sup par shooting.

I generally agree with this sentiment. From a mechanical perspective, most witchfires (with a few exceptions) are good but not overpowering. Having an enemy cover his ears and shut his eyes until my witchfires go away is annoying. That said, part of me really likes the idea of a space wolf or super psyker willing the magical flames not to burn him anime-protagonist style.

Also, some powers are actually pretty nasty if they can't be shut down (I'm thinking of cleansing flame mostly).

I'd personally probably prefer a return to purchasable (non-random) powers with witchfires being undeniable but also being priced fairly based on how much damage they can do. This would actually make witchfires interestingly distinct from maledictions, blessings etc. What's that? You're willing away my attempts to cloud your mind with psychic hallucinations? Cool. I'll just conjure fireballs instead.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:
Have Witchfires not be Deny-able. I mean most of them are manifesting something and then hurling it (Flickering Fire of Tzeentch) so how are you "willing away" something that is already here?

Armor/Invulns already exist, we dont need no add Deny the Witch to defense rolls for sup par shooting.

Also, some powers are actually pretty nasty if they can't be shut down (I'm thinking of cleansing flame mostly).

I'd personally probably prefer a return to purchasable (non-random) powers with witchfires being undeniable but also being priced fairly based on how much damage they can do. This would actually make witchfires interestingly distinct from maledictions, blessings etc. What's that? You're willing away my attempts to cloud your mind with psychic hallucinations? Cool. I'll just conjure fireballs instead.

Yes some are nasty, but they are just guns, guns that have a fairly decent chance of killing the person using them. Cleansing Flame is an Ignores Cover Heavy Bolter, with 9 inch range. True it can have 12 shots, but it can also have 2. I see nothing unreasonable about Manifest, Shoot, Save, FnP.

I agree, the Bastard Abomination of WHFB casting and 6th ed Psychic Powers that we currently have is a mess. I saw no actual problem with the old system. Spend the Warp Charges, make the LD test, do the thing. Now bring back 4th eds purchasing of powers and we'll be all set.

Wyldhunt wrote:

Taffy17 wrote:
Personally I've never noticed. it's only one roll more than with a shooting attack, and there's usually a lot less actions to do in the psychic phase than the shooting phase. Also this would make Eldar even more OP.

Respectfully, sir or madame, I'm not sure this change would have a terribly large impact upon eldar psychic offense. I mean, it would make them more OP in the same sense that making storm guardian chainswords Ap6 would make them more OP. It's technically an improvement, but hardly the most dramatic effect the suggested change would have.

Its sir, or just Taffy

Maybe I'm just prejudice against Eldar, I play against them a lot and I'm a Tau player so I'm already a little bitter at how deadly having a strong psychic phase can be.

considering most of the Witchfire is pretty...meh...i'd be fine with this.

Also makes the Weirdboy's witchfire actually DO SOMETHING. ... ... yes lets give a Focused Witchfire to a bs2 model..brilliant