Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I'm not screaming in panic over the 7th edition Psychic Phase (um, yet?), but I can't help noticing that the new Deny The Witch rules are a little hard on armies that don't have any psykers, like Black Templars or my beloved Sororitas. (Yes, you can ally in anything now, but you shouldn't have to). The new rules let an army without psykers attempt to Deny the Witch 1d6 times a turn, which is ok for a small force but doesn't scale. At all.

So, being me, rather than proposing a house rule, I'm homebrewing wargear to try to fix the problem, on the theory that "if you pay points for it, people will be more likely to play against it."

[The final (?) versions of much of this wargear -- and 30 new units -- are now in my fandex/expandex.]

Purity Seals: 10 points
Purity Seals are a wargear option for any Adeptus Astartes, Adepta Sororitas, or Astra Militarum character.
These frail pieces of parchment contain staggering spiritual strength, for they are inscribed with innumerable blessings and certify the purity of the wearer. Against the whispers of the warp and the maledictions of the witch, a purity seal can be more effective than any physical armour.
If a unit contains a model with a purity seal, then once per turn it may roll a single die to Deny The Witch without its controlling player expending a Warp Die. The unit may only attempt to deny a psychic power of which it was a target.

Costing: Turning a vanilla Inquisitor into a Mastery Level 1 psyker costs 30 points, which gives you one Warp Die for offensive in your own psychic phase and one Warp Die for defense of any of your units in the enemy's psychic phase. This wargear just gives you the equivalent of one Warp Die for defense only and for only one unit, so I figure that's roughly 1/3 as valuable.

This is fluffed as Imperium wargear, but I see no reason other races wouldn't have some kind of equivalent -- maybe some poor bastard's preserved skull for Chaos and Dark Eldar, a wraithbone amulet for Craftworld Eldar, an exotic gadget for Tau, and some kind of ... throbbing yucky growth for Tyranids?

[EDIT: Two more items of psychic defense wargear -- the Sororitas Praesidium Protectiva and Black Templar Templar Cross -- are below.]

One of the bonuses to bringing a psychic-heavy army is that your opponent will be less able to DtW. It's a valid strategy, and should be rewarded appropriately.
One of the detriments to skimping on psykers is that you are less able to DtW again your opponent.
Nerfing (however slightly) the psychic player, while buffing (however slightly) the non-psyker may be a good move. But I think 13pts would be a more appropriate cost. (And since 13 is a nasty number to work with, we should just round it to 15.)

That being said, I really like this idea!

I do like the idea, but it should definitely be available to all races, even the psychic ones.

I would only make it available to HQ choices though, as for 10-15 points every squad leader could go around with one and get loads of extra deny rolls for the army.

Thanks. You two have made me realize 10 points probably is too cheap, since in some ways it replaces buying a much more expensive Psyker, not just a Mastery Level. So 15 or maybe even 20 points.

I'd hesitate to restrict it to HQs only, though, since that would mean a max of two per army. Perhaps armies with no psyker option (Black Templars, Sororitas, Dark Eldar, Tau) should be allowed to take more than armies that do have psykers?

Purity Seals should probably be Imperial only. Tau can get a more techy sounding version, but not Purity Seals for they have no souls.

I Loathe the Psychic Phase and Purity Seals are a Band Aid when 40k needs an appendectomy. It's a lot like all the fixes for walkers that we tried to plaster over 6th Ed's rules.

Maybe? I might suggest that lorewise except in extreme cases a psyker-less army is fairly defenseless against psykers, and the Sisters' "extreme case" is them all having Adamantium Will. It's not an unreasonable or unreasonably-priced item, but I'd suggest adding a clause to specify you can't get the extra die if there's a psyker attached to your unit.

Allow me to present two more pieces of wargear specifically for armies that have no psykers at all:

Praesidium Protectiva: 30 points
(Adeptus Sororitas Canoness or Palatine only)


Templar Cross: 30 points
(Independent Characters with Chapter Tactics: Black Templars, only)


I'm also thinking the Purity Seal should not stack with a friendly psyker, either, as Anomander suggested above.

J3f's right, none of this will "fix" the psychic phase -- but at least it will de-nerf Deny The Witch and make low- or no-psyker armies are more viable choice. Fluff may portray such an army as dead men walking if opposing psykers, but that's not much fun as a game....

[EDIT: To de-stupidify the wording of Templar Cross -- thanks, Macc92, for pointing that error out.]

We could always steal some ideas from fantasy. Like I know dwarfs have (or had) a piece of wargear that steals dice to cast. Perhaps we could have some kind of wargear that causes extreme pain to psykers and makes it hard for them to focus. The result would be take away two warp charges dice from the enemy and add it to your own pool. You may not use this item if you fielded a friendly psyker.

As I said elsewhere, I think that the easiest thing would be to make AW into a 'half psyker (ml1)' that only gives you dice to deny. This would be approximately equivalent to adding +1, but scales based on how many strong willed people you bring. It would also allow nulls to be represented on the table, as they can have AW level 2 or 3.

 Paimon wrote:
As I said elsewhere, I think that the easiest thing would be to make AW into a 'half psyker (ml1)' that only gives you dice to deny. This would be approximately equivalent to adding +1, but scales based on how many strong willed people you bring. It would also allow nulls to be represented on the table, as they can have AW level 2 or 3.

I rather like this. Sisters would be the ultimate anti-psyker force with (almost) every unit they have having Shield of Faith. Still Necrons don't get anything in the Form of Anti-Psyker goodies.

The only models I can see getting AW 2 or 3 is the Cullexus Assassin or Kharn.

 SisterSydney wrote:


Templar Cross: 30 points
(Independent Characters with Chapter Tactics: Black Templars, only)

Spoiler:

This splendid jet-black adamantium cross inspires Black Templars with furious strength of will.
If a unit has Chapter Tactics: Black Templars and is within 12" of the model bearing the Templar Cross, it gains the Adamantium Will special rule. No unit may take this bonus and a bonus from a friendly psyker attached to the unit or using a psychic hood on its behalf, however.

Design notes: It's designed to fill the place of a psychic hood for an army that doesn't have psykers. Assuming the bearer's own unit and two others are in range, on average, that's Adamantium Will x 3 = 30 pts.

Black Templars have Adamantium will already in their chapter tactic

Never really thought about this sort of thing, though its a great idea on paper.
Basically allowing psykerless armies to generate deny dice would be great.

To make sure it "balances", because of allies and stuff, here's a rule thing to consider:

Templar Cross: 10 Points
Added to "Special Equipment" section of SM codex, notated as CT:Black Templars only, added to obtainable wargear of Sword Brother for same cost
Adds 1 Dispel Dice per model in detachment equipped with this dice, but reduces the number of casting dice by 1 [Can reduce to 0! ABHOR THE WITCH!!]

 J3f wrote:

 Paimon wrote:
As I said elsewhere, I think that the easiest thing would be to make AW into a 'half psyker (ml1)' that only gives you dice to deny. This would be approximately equivalent to adding +1, but scales based on how many strong willed people you bring. It would also allow nulls to be represented on the table, as they can have AW level 2 or 3.

I rather like this. Sisters would be the ultimate anti-psyker force with (almost) every unit they have having Shield of Faith. Still Necrons don't get anything in the Form of Anti-Psyker goodies.

The only models I can see getting AW 2 or 3 is the Cullexus Assassin or Kharn.

Necrons can fill the table with Gloom Prisms (friendly units within 3" ignore incoming psychic powers on a 4+) if they want.

Gloom Prism is nasty. Necron allies for everyone! Err, except you'd need to buy an awful lot of scarabs and constantly suffer One Eye Open because it has a range of 3".

Necrosis wrote:We could always steal some ideas from fantasy. Like I know dwarfs have (or had) a piece of wargear that steals dice to cast. Perhaps we could have some kind of wargear that causes extreme pain to psykers and makes it hard for them to focus. The result would be take away two warp charges dice from the enemy and add it to your own pool. You may not use this item if you fielded a friendly psyker.

Very interesting. Not just psychic defense but an actual anti-psyker weapon in many ways. It really ought to have to roll against... something... to work, though. Also I prefer ranged effects to dice pools for the entire army, because they're more tactically interesting, e.g. you'd have to maneuver this thing within 12" of an enemy psyker.

Paimon wrote:As I said elsewhere, I think that the easiest thing would be to make AW into a 'half psyker (ml1)' that only gives you dice to deny. This would be approximately equivalent to adding +1, but scales based on how many strong willed people you bring. It would also allow nulls to be represented on the table, as they can have AW level 2 or 3.

Also very interesting. A more fundamental fix than what I'm attempting, but well worth considering in a more ambitious "fix the psychic phase" discussion; I'd recommend you crosspost your idea it in this thread and I will follow you over to comment.

macc92 wrote:Black Templars have Adamantium will already in their chapter tactic

And I have "hurr durr" in mine, apparently. Thanks for the catch. Fixed now.

Also
Sisterz + Templarz 4 Eva / Abhor The Bitch / War Of Faith Galactic Tour M41


Automatically Appended Next Post:

StarHunter25 wrote:

To make sure it "balances", because of allies and stuff, here's a rule thing to consider:

Templar Cross: 10 Points
Added to "Special Equipment" section of SM codex, notated as CT:Black Templars only, added to obtainable wargear of Sword Brother for same cost
Adds 1 Dispel Dice per model in detachment equipped with this dice, but reduces the number of casting dice by 1 [Can reduce to 0! ABHOR THE WITCH!!]

Hmmm. More complex, but more characterful. Which do Templars fans think is the best form of the rule?

To be fair, while I like the idea, I can see it going the other way: give Sisters and Templars something that punishes psykers (other than that silly Condemnor Boltgun). Add options for Null Rods, add some sort of null bullets ("nullets" ), and some sort of rules to focus on the fact that both the factions hate (non-Imperial) psykers. In essence, make Templars and Sisters the anti-psyker armies.

 SisterSydney wrote:

StarHunter25 wrote:

To make sure it "balances", because of allies and stuff, here's a rule thing to consider:

Templar Cross: 10 Points
Added to "Special Equipment" section of SM codex, notated as CT:Black Templars only, added to obtainable wargear of Sword Brother for same cost
Adds 1 Dispel Dice per model in detachment equipped with this dice, but reduces the number of casting dice by 1 [Can reduce to 0! ABHOR THE WITCH!!]

Hmmm. More complex, but more characterful. Which do Templars fans think is the best form of the rule?

Punishing Templars for bringing psykers is a nerf I'd be happy with TBH if it let the army defend against psychic powers better on their own. Abhor the witch, destroy the witch!

Going back to the Praesidium Protectiva it feels like it does too much as you've written it in there; I wrote it into a homebrew Inquisition Codex project as a 4+ Inv, I don't think making it a Storm Shield plus more toys is thematically appropriate but a lighter Storm Shield plus an extra characterful toy may work.

Anomander, I pondered dropping the Praesidium down to a 4++, actually, but I preferred the idea of it as a superior Storm Shield, because who'd put a (supposed) shard of the Emperor's Armour in anything inferior? Why's that thematically inappropriate? I'm always ready to be convinced.

Walrus, psyker-punishing wargear is definitely worth exploring. We'd have to share it with the Inquisition, though, since all three major Ordos deal with pyskers (human, daemon, or alien) and are far more likely to get specialist anti-psyker equipment than Templars or Sisters.

You mean like a Null Rod?

 Furyou Miko wrote:

 J3f wrote:

 Paimon wrote:
As I said elsewhere, I think that the easiest thing would be to make AW into a 'half psyker (ml1)' that only gives you dice to deny. This would be approximately equivalent to adding +1, but scales based on how many strong willed people you bring. It would also allow nulls to be represented on the table, as they can have AW level 2 or 3.

I rather like this. Sisters would be the ultimate anti-psyker force with (almost) every unit they have having Shield of Faith. Still Necrons don't get anything in the Form of Anti-Psyker goodies.

The only models I can see getting AW 2 or 3 is the Cullexus Assassin or Kharn.

Necrons can fill the table with Gloom Prisms (friendly units within 3" ignore incoming psychic powers on a 4+) if they want.

Actually the gloom prism was errataed to give you +2 on your deny dice to units within 3". Soooo unhelpful when you only get 1d6 every phase.

 AnomanderRake wrote:
Maybe? I might suggest that lorewise except in extreme cases a psyker-less army is fairly defenseless against psykers, and the Sisters' "extreme case" is them all having Adamantium Will. It's not an unreasonable or unreasonably-priced item, but I'd suggest adding a clause to specify you can't get the extra die if there's a psyker attached to your unit.

It would be quite fluffy for the Necrons to have anti-psyker gear flying out the ass. And for the Tau, Kroot Psykers do exist in the fluff and I think they could provide an easy no bull solution to Tau psychic defense.

 Kain wrote:

 AnomanderRake wrote:
Maybe? I might suggest that lorewise except in extreme cases a psyker-less army is fairly defenseless against psykers, and the Sisters' "extreme case" is them all having Adamantium Will. It's not an unreasonable or unreasonably-priced item, but I'd suggest adding a clause to specify you can't get the extra die if there's a psyker attached to your unit.

It would be quite fluffy for the Necrons to have anti-psyker gear flying out the ass. And for the Tau, Kroot Psykers do exist in the fluff and I think they could provide an easy no bull solution to Tau psychic defense.

That defeats the purpose of the Tau though. they shouldn't be forced to take Psykers especially not Kroot Psykers. Every army that isn't Eldar, Tyranids, or Grey Knights, should have a decent psychic defense without having to take psykers. I want fluffy armies where Psykers are quite rare, every platoon shouldn't come standard with one like they were an imperium issued medkit.

Agreed. I think the Tau should get some kind of brute-force psychic static emitter -- a jamming device, essentially -- since they've only recently encountered psykers.

The Necrons have been fighting psyskers for countless centuries with insanely sophisticated tech, so I think they should have some kind of device that turns psykers' power against them, turning the opponent's warp dice into your own for denial dice, like StarHunter's idea.

Dark Eldar should have something that inflicts PAIN on enemy psykers, because PAIN. They're using old Eldar tech that's more sophisticated than anything in the Imperium but less so than the Necrons.

And then everyone should have some kind of Purity Seal equivalent.

 SisterSydney wrote:
Agreed. I think the Tau should get some kind of brute-force psychic static emitter -- a jamming device, essentially -- since they've only recently encountered psykers.

The Necrons have been fighting psyskers for countless centuries with insanely sophisticated tech, so I think they should have some kind of device that turns psykers' power against them, turning the opponent's warp dice into your own for denial dice, like StarHunter's idea.

Dark Eldar should have something that inflicts PAIN on enemy psykers, because PAIN. They're using old Eldar tech that's more sophisticated than anything in the Imperium but less so than the Necrons.

And then everyone should have some kind of Purity Seal equivalent.

In addition to Gloom Prisms, I can see the likes of Pariahs making a return who can possibly "lolnope" powers in their range and like Culexus assassins cannot be directly affected by Psychic abilities (while also causing fear effects that are more strongly felt by Psykers), Warpmancer Crypteks wielding Psychic disruption devices that decrease your ability to successfully cast a power (your dice only pass on fives or sixes or so), Null Pylon fortifications that add a wide area psychic defence, and perhaps Overlord wargear that gives them Adamantium will or more deny dice. Essentially a Necron army is about as Anti-Psyker as you can get. Absolutely no access to Psykers outside of Come the Apocalypse allies, but are very well suited to fighting against them.

Kroot psykers can be an option, but like you said the main Tau psychic defence should probably be technological in nature, with Kroot Psykers mostly being there because I love the Kroot and I think they need more love outside of being hapless meatshields in competetive Tau armies (it's a damn shame that the supposed assault specialists of the Tau are so godawful at assault). Something you could take in fluffy armies, but ultimately secondary to the main Tau methods of defence.

I can agree with the DEldar.

There has been a bit of talk of pariahs/nulls going on once we got the DTW! dice giver thingies ironed out kinda.

Here's an idea; they have "Adamantium Will [+2]" themselves, but their big psychic "defense" is that ANY psyker that is within xx inches, lets say 3 for now, suffers a perils of the warp, which cannot be stopped in any way. So no sneaky ghosthelms or whatnot. Your soul is being erased you silly eldar. 90% of human pariahs who are discovered are promptly turned into anti-psyker assassins, so that is easily reflected in their point cost etc.

In fact, this could be an inventive solution to how SitW functions. Rather than "HA YOU PERILS BECAUSE I'M CLOSE" have them persils more often, say on double any double 5/6. Have different tiers of it. Have lv1 (warriors, zoanthropes) be "enemy psykers must re-roll successful manifestation dice", lv2 (Tervigons, [Warrior/Trygon] prime) do lv1 + perils on 5's also, and lv3 (Tyrants, Nirn Queen, Gargantuans) lv1 + ANY double cases Perils.

As for Tau... they have fought against Necrons canonically, even though that cannon is sketchy at best in the form of DoW: Dark Crusade and Soulstorm. I'm sure they would have taken apart a few of the TOTALLY NO LONGER EXISTS NECRON PARIAH WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT CRAZY PERSON WHO PLAYS VIDEOGAMES. Perhaps they took some replicateable technology from the NECRONS WHOM DON'T EXIST COUGH COUGH and have created some experimental new subsystems. These systems, because of [insert WH40k xeno technobabble here] only properly functions when incorporated into a stealth field generator. This could give us the say... XV25-2. The Tau, seeing the potential weakness in lacking any kind of psychic defence biologically have once again turned to their technological prowess to create a suit which inhibits how these "Psykers" access the warp. Though the activation of said anti-psyker defenses does make the stealth field less effective, the application is very much appearant.

I dont know enough about sororitas fluff to come up with something for them, nor do I have desire to do so.

Sororitas survive against psykers by letting the psykers know how Tinkerbell felt when Wendy said, "But there's no such thing as Faeries!"

Well, I've just created a new topic on Anti-Psyker gears for Tau and ED

How does it looks ?

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/598554.page

Cool ideas in that thread. I'm heading over to comment. Everyone, follow me!

Anti-psyker wargear definitely has a place in the new edition, but as everyone has been saying, purity seals should probably be 15 pts. Also, give them a special rule that they can't be equipped to psykers, and that psykers can't join a unit if another character in the unit has purity seals. That makes it more of a "non-psyker" thing.

As far as the sororitas shield, it looks good to me. I really don't see much need to mess with it.
The last part of the BT's cross rule could be a little clearer. Does it just prevent these units from benefiting from psykers for DTW, or does it prevent them from benefiting from psychic blessings as well?

Also, it seems like maybe Khorne daemons and CSMs should get something. Maybe less focused on defense and more focused on helping them kill the heck out of enemy psykers.

 SisterSydney wrote:
Anomander, I pondered dropping the Praesidium down to a 4++, actually, but I preferred the idea of it as a superior Storm Shield, because who'd put a (supposed) shard of the Emperor's Armour in anything inferior? Why's that thematically inappropriate? I'm always ready to be convinced.

Termie armour, shard of the Emperor's armour in the shoulder for a 5++ Inv.

As to the thematic inappropriateness it's big, heavy, unwieldy, unsubtle, and to paraphrase some of the counterarguments against giving the Sisters a Storm Eagle variant over in that thread (which I don't have on hand right now) we're taking a too-powerful jack-of-all-trades Mary-Sue sort of terrifying all-purpose tool and trying to hand it to someone who is supposed to have some element of distinctive character beyond "Space Marine with boobs". It feels wrong, sort of like giving the Sisters Terminator armour that also made them immune to Deep Strike mishaps would feel wrong. We'd be giving the Sisters of Battle something too tough for Space Marines to use.

Ironically, the big special rule for Psychic Defense, (Admantium Will), the only rule which non-Psykers can take which exists solely for defending from Psychic Powers, is only useful in armies with lots of Psykers. Sisters of Battle still can't deny worth jack, with a maximum of 6 denied charges in a pure-sister army, and an average of 1 succesful 5+ per turn.
10 Points is not at all unreasonable, so long as you limit access. You can buy offensive Warp Charges in Inquisition squads for 18 points each.
Really, though, buying 'defensive warp charges' isn't fluffy or cool. True Witch-Haters should make it harder to cast the powers in the first place, and be able to pray their way through witchfires without giving in in the slightest.