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What do you think happens to human psykers (or psykers from other T'au-allied races) who are born on T'au-controlled worlds?

To me, the most likely possibility is that the T'au, being pretty much psychically inert (neither psykers nor pariahs), are at a loss when it comes to psykers. They don't know how to use psykers' abilities to their empire's advantage, and neither do they realize the full extent of the danger psykers pose. It's like a whole issue they've never had to worry about until fairly recently and which only ever seems to be a problem on worlds with a large human population. I would assume they tell humans to keep them under control by whatever means possible. "Look, you guys are the ones with psykers, not us. Do whatever you used to do with them before we came along... just make sure they don't cause trouble to the Empire."

Without the Inquisition rounding up every psyker and mutant in sight, it's likely that untrained psykers run rampant, unless some human worlds in T'au space have managed to establish their own psyker training facilities (likely less harsh than the ones on Terra, and without a daily human sacrifice to the Golden Throne).

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How grim do you want you grimdark?

On one hand you have them gathering and teaching each other to safely use their powers, not being sent off to become fuel for the astronomicon. Finding their full potential as a psychic race.

On the flip side, you have heads exploding, demonic possession, and rampant warp energies leaking into realspace, until eventually it becomes a demon world, where the terrors from beyond consume the souls of every living thing on he planet.

They have plenty of psychic client races. No doubt they have learnt to let them manage their own populations within whatever parameters.

I'm with The_Real_Chris. Nicassar are the obvious psychic leads in the Tau Empire. Demiurg/Votann have their own psychic gubbinz, and arguably could have sold their warp-protection technology to the Tau.

 Nevelon wrote:
On the flip side, you have heads exploding, demonic possession, and rampant warp energies leaking into realspace, until eventually it becomes a demon world, where the terrors from beyond consume the souls of every living thing on he planet.

I think the most likely event involving a potent untrained psyker is that they self-destruct long before they attain planet-destroying power. Humankind did manage to survive quite a long time before the Inquisition came along.

The_Real_Chris wrote:They have plenty of psychic client races. No doubt they have learnt to let them manage their own populations within whatever parameters.

Flinty wrote:I'm with The_Real_Chris. Nicassar are the obvious psychic leads in the Tau Empire. Demiurg/Votann have their own psychic gubbinz, and arguably could have sold their warp-protection technology to the Tau.

Oh, interesting. I hadn't heard of the Nicassar.

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Wasn't the old human woman in the Shadowsun book a psyker? Or am I misremembering?

Either way, we have instances of the tau working with psychic guavesa (see: the inquisitor from the Farsight books).

The impression I got from the Shadowsun/Farsight novels was that there are cliques of human psykers that seem to be carrying on a variation of imperial psyker practices (utilizing the tarot for instance). I assume that they're basically creating wizard schools to help identify/train psykers from tau-aligned human populations.

I'm not aware that humankind commonly experienced such psykocalypses during the many spacefaring millennia preceding the founding of the Inquisition, so this must be a very rare occurrence. I think the most likely event involving a potent untrained psyker is that they self-destruct long before they attain planet-destroying power.

One psyker resulting in a planet becoming a daemon world is technically possible, but it seems to be the exception rather than the rule. We have tons of examples of rogue psykers that just self-immolate or get possessed, etc. before fizzling out after a bit. And the tau are organized and innovative enough to have a good chance of combating/surviving a relatively minor warp breach even if the daemons are actively trying to make it easier to bring in more daemons via sacrifice, terror, etc.

 Nevelon wrote:
How grim do you want you grimdark?

On one hand you have them gathering and teaching each other to safely use their powers, not being sent off to become fuel for the astronomicon. Finding their full potential as a psychic race.

On the flip side, you have heads exploding, demonic possession, and rampant warp energies leaking into realspace, until eventually it becomes a demon world, where the terrors from beyond consume the souls of every living thing on he planet.

Pretty much this, in my opinion.

We know the Tau don’t have a great understanding of it, referring to it as Mind Science. Which in turn would suggest, not being idiots, they’d know to leave psychically talented species to manage this power of incredible potential their Benevolent Overlords can’t wield, and thus will always have a limited understanding of.

But, on the Imperium’s oppression of psykers? It’s not Hungry Hungry Emperors. Psykers are very dangerous. Untrained, each and everyone is a potential daemon portal waiting to happen, even if it’s just a single Daemon on their holibobs piloting a meatsuit. Even trained, you need to wield your powers with caution. Now, given most Imperial Worlds will have a population in the billions, and only limited oversight, despite what it might desire? Having a culture of fear around them isn’t an entirely unnecessary cruelty, but a way of ensuring a vigilant population.

With the Tau enclaves? They’re no less dangerous. But, with allegedly better living conditions for all? Theoretically comes the opportunity to better monitor your happy, well fed populace for emergent psykers, gather them up in a reassuring way, and see what their potential is. I’d wager the very powerful are still put down pretty quickly, as they’re a significant risk, even with training and geegaws and that. Those of strictly limited power? Again might just be offed. Or they might all be offed. Better Safe Than Sorry, after all.

I guess it depends exactly who is leading the human population. A Rogue Inquisitor, tired of the unending horror of their profession could go either way “yay! Now we can train them in not hellish conditions” or “that’s a no from me, and indeed, a no from Mr Bolt Pistol”.

If it’s purely civilians, as in no big movers and shakers betrayed their Emperor? That could genuinely be a massive problem, as maybe there’s nothing and no one to teach the Psykers how to best wield and control their otherworldly powers.

I think this is another one of those things where 40k's spectacle for the audience clashes with whatever passes in-universe for normalcy. Quite obviously humanity spread across the stars before the Great Crusade, and from then to the current 40k there's always been stories of rediscovering lost human populations, or parts that have been cut off for ages upon ages.

Some of those, of course, will have whatever local versions or variants of Imperial-model controls, and others will indeed have varying cataclysms occur, including warp breaches arising from psykers becoming possessed or what have you. But there are also lots of places where that doesn't happen. Human colonies incorporated into the Tau empire are likely similar, but with more planetary governments that have some level of draconian Imperial measures, if we presume that the majority of human colonies in Tau space were conquered recently.

So no doubt some portion of those have warp events - and perhaps a higher proportion than in Human Imperium space, and ergo a higher proportion might have cataclysmic events, but it doesn't seem like it's going to be SO high in frequency that the Tau are going to much about it. We see from the stories of the Fourth Sphere that it's certainly possible for Tau Empire authorities to take on a much more Imperial style approach with the kinds of purges and xenocides and all, but that's also treated as something the rest of the Empire finds at least remarkable, even if they don't really try to rein them in, so I'd think it's not business as usual in more core Tau space. Enough of those sorts of events and maybe it happens, but it's important to remember that the Empire is extremely young in relation to the Imperium. An audience member could interpret them as at the start of the journey that the Eldar and Humans before them went through, or could interpret them as being able to learn to do otherwise, but either way it seems most plausible to me that, at least for the current time, it's probably just seen as an unfortunate periodic occurrence.

Cynically, it might even help with that population control piece from the other thread - "let the humans wipe themselves out, our hands are clean if they do it to themselves" might well be a policy some Tau bigwigs favour.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
How grim do you want you grimdark?

On one hand you have them gathering and teaching each other to safely use their powers, not being sent off to become fuel for the astronomicon. Finding their full potential as a psychic race.

On the flip side, you have heads exploding, demonic possession, and rampant warp energies leaking into realspace, until eventually it becomes a demon world, where the terrors from beyond consume the souls of every living thing on he planet.

Pretty much this, in my opinion.

We know the Tau don’t have a great understanding of it, referring to it as Mind Science. Which in turn would suggest, not being idiots, they’d know to leave psychically talented species to manage this power of incredible potential their Benevolent Overlords can’t wield, and thus will always have a limited understanding of.

But, on the Imperium’s oppression of psykers? It’s not Hungry Hungry Emperors. Psykers are very dangerous. Untrained, each and everyone is a potential daemon portal waiting to happen, even if it’s just a single Daemon on their holibobs piloting a meatsuit. Even trained, you need to wield your powers with caution. Now, given most Imperial Worlds will have a population in the billions, and only limited oversight, despite what it might desire? Having a culture of fear around them isn’t an entirely unnecessary cruelty, but a way of ensuring a vigilant population.

With the Tau enclaves? They’re no less dangerous. But, with allegedly better living conditions for all? Theoretically comes the opportunity to better monitor your happy, well fed populace for emergent psykers, gather them up in a reassuring way, and see what their potential is. I’d wager the very powerful are still put down pretty quickly, as they’re a significant risk, even with training and geegaws and that. Those of strictly limited power? Again might just be offed. Or they might all be offed. Better Safe Than Sorry, after all.

I guess it depends exactly who is leading the human population. A Rogue Inquisitor, tired of the unending horror of their profession could go either way “yay! Now we can train them in not hellish conditions” or “that’s a no from me, and indeed, a no from Mr Bolt Pistol”.

If it’s purely civilians, as in no big movers and shakers betrayed their Emperor? That could genuinely be a massive problem, as maybe there’s nothing and no one to teach the Psykers how to best wield and control their otherworldly powers.

This assumes that the Imperial methods for psyker control are the only method or even effective at all. Given the Imperium tends to generate most of its own problems, I would not be at all surprised if its draconian approach to psykers is actually counterproductive and makes psykers more dangerous.

Psychic powers (and the Warp) are effected by emotions. Mass paranoia and bigoted witch hunts plausibly destablise the local warpspace, attract warp predators, and cause psykers emotional distress that destabilises their powers.

Basically, don't take the Imperium's propaganda at face value. Lots of human worlds survived Old Night, plenty of them retained psyker traditions.

From the 4th Sphere Expansion background and the novel Shadowsun, the Tau are surprised and horrified at the full scale daemonic outbreak. These are also the movers and shakers, like Shadowsun, who one would think would be privy to the highest level of information, not rank and file grunts. This suggests that the Tau have not experienced a full scale daemonic outbreak before, and this is several centuries after the Damocles Crusade retreated. So clearly something has been happening to deal with psykers and preventing daemonic manifestation at a level that becomes all but impossible to conceal.

On Haighus’ response?

Keep in mind that part of what lead to Old Night was the emergence of Psykers within humanity, and the daemonic hijinks that ensued.

Now, are the Imperium’s method the best way to deal with the ongoing issue of untrained and unguarded Psykers? I genuinely don’t think we can say.

There must have been other approaches pre-Great Crusade, as a fair amount of the worlds brought into the Imperium had survived, and must have found some way to police that issue.

But that was 10,000+ years ago. And 10,000 years of The Imperium’s management programme. So if there were other, friendlier and/or effective methods? They’ve most likely been forgotten or deliberately destroyed. But the threat remains the same, and arguably more serious given the Warp is playing an active hand.

The argument about happier lives = fewer daemons (sorry, paraphrasing) is an interesting one. If someone is content with a full belly, you’re removing a great deal of motivation to seek more power. But that still doesn’t mean the Powers That Be would suddenly be nice and chill to Psykers. Heck, the Tau might have their own pogroms about it, as it’s something they can’t harness or control. What could be more Greater Good than “maybe don’t let potential warp rifts wander about Willy Nilly”.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
On Haighus’ response?

Keep in mind that part of what lead to Old Night was the emergence of Psykers within humanity, and the daemonic hijinks that ensued.

Now, are the Imperium’s method the best way to deal with the ongoing issue of untrained and unguarded Psykers? I genuinely don’t think we can say.

There must have been other approaches pre-Great Crusade, as a fair amount of the worlds brought into the Imperium had survived, and must have found some way to police that issue.

But that was 10,000+ years ago. And 10,000 years of The Imperium’s management programme. So if there were other, friendlier and/or effective methods? They’ve most likely been forgotten or deliberately destroyed. But the threat remains the same, and arguably more serious given the Warp is playing an active hand.

The argument about happier lives = fewer daemons (sorry, paraphrasing) is an interesting one. If someone is content with a full belly, you’re removing a great deal of motivation to seek more power. But that still doesn’t mean the Powers That Be would suddenly be nice and chill to Psykers. Heck, the Tau might have their own pogroms about it, as it’s something they can’t harness or control. What could be more Greater Good than “maybe don’t let potential warp rifts wander about Willy Nilly”.

Well, the narrative we have is that humanity was degenerate and tolerant, and was punished for it by the Age of Strife. Then the noble and righteous Imperium rises from the ashes, and avoids the degeneracy of the past through harsh displine and ruthless brutality against the Other. The Other was the cause of all that went wrong before, so all means are justified in suppressimg it.

This is the Imperium's perspective, and is essentially textbook fascist propaganda. But we have plenty of bits of lore that cast doubt upon this thesis, especially now the Leagues are fleshed out. For starters, the proximate cause of the Age of Strife was The Fall of the Eldar and the birth of Slaanesh. Humanity developing widespread psykers towards the end of the Dark Age of Technology may have simply been an unfortunate coincidence. Stress is known to destabilise psykers- using psyker powers on the battlefield is especially dangerous for this reason- so pogroms against psykers logically makes them more dangerous. The Leagues tell us that the Imperium's fears of AI are much less absolute given they have coexisted with AI for millennia- this could mean the same is true of psykers.

I am inclined to believe that the threat posed by psykers is either overblown, or worsened by the Imperium's actions in the same way the forces of Chaos are bolstered by the actions of the Imperium in general. This generally fits with the theme that the Imperium is its own worst nightmare (and is in line with 40k being fascist satire instead of apologia).

-Guardsman- wrote:
What do you think happens to human psykers (or psykers from other T'au-allied races) who are born on T'au-controlled worlds?

They are most likely 'greater-gooded' out of the picture by client races and the Ethereals own withheld technologies (such as the vespid 'interface' device). All quietly and behind the scenes and likely unknown to all but a few Tau.

As well as potentially stuff in the water, extensions of the existing sterilization of and population monitoring, and the tiny scale of the Tau empire itself when combined with the rarity of alpha+ psykers who might become dangerous before they can be outweighed by the needs of the many.

 Haighus wrote:

Well, the narrative we have is that humanity was degenerate and tolerant, and was punished for it by the Age of Strife. Then the noble and righteous Imperium rises from the ashes, and avoids the degeneracy of the past through harsh displine and ruthless brutality against the Other. The Other was the cause of all that went wrong before, so all means are justified in suppressimg it.

This is the Imperium's perspective, and is essentially textbook fascist propaganda. But we have plenty of bits of lore that cast doubt upon this thesis, especially now the Leagues are fleshed out. For starters, the proximate cause of the Age of Strife was The Fall of the Eldar and the birth of Slaanesh. Humanity developing widespread psykers towards the end of the Dark Age of Technology may have simply been an unfortunate coincidence. Stress is known to destabilise psykers- using psyker powers on the battlefield is especially dangerous for this reason- so pogroms against psykers logically makes them more dangerous. The Leagues tell us that the Imperium's fears of AI are much less absolute given they have coexisted with AI for millennia- this could mean the same is true of psykers.

I am inclined to believe that the threat posed by psykers is either overblown, or worsened by the Imperium's actions in the same way the forces of Chaos are bolstered by the actions of the Imperium in general. This generally fits with the theme that the Imperium is its own worst nightmare (and is in line with 40k being fascist satire instead of apologia).

Trying to avoid getting too real worldy here, but I think this is part of the crux of what makes 40k both interesting but also hard to define... well, definitively. We know that the cosmological arrangement of the universe is that emotions manifest in another realm and then interact with the physical realm, and within the universe there are a variety of ideological positions, both on what's real and what ought to be done about it.

The lore will of course emphasise different things based on a given author or editorial or corporate line or audience zeitgeist. Chris Peach did a recent video on Commissars and I was reminded that back in 2E they didn't do the battlefield execution thing and then did in 3E. The commentariat classes like ourselves might differ over why the ludonarrative presentation went that way, but the fact of the matter is that it did and does and will be depicted differently for a whole host of reasons. This seems similar with the Imperium-Human and Tau-Empire-Human or Votann situation, or even the Drukhari and other Eldar situation.

In some ways, I think the furore from the audience is a result of the way in which social media hot takes happen, but that's not particularly new; as any franchise gets expanded, any given individual audience member's capacity to assimilate all the media about it will vary from the next person's, but that's also true of the writers (and that's leaving aside all the other influences). People give directors or actors or scriptwriters a lot of flak for various TV or movies, but these things happen in a huge system with lots of hands, and that's certainly the case with warhammer of all sorts.

 Haighus wrote:
[snip] The Leagues tell us that the Imperium's fears of AI are much less absolute given they have coexisted with AI for millennia- this could mean the same is true of psykers.

Yeah, but the Votann have suddenly been parachuted into the narrative with suitable handwavium applied.

The established lore states that Imperial AIs led to an extinction-level event. Established lore states that humanity's psychic sensitivity also risks extinction level events.

Having to address lots of other things in the lore suggests that not every psyker outbreak can lead to extinction, but Imperial doctrine is to assume any event is the big one as that is the most grimdarknessy way to go and enables the maximum amount of oppression.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Haighus wrote:
[snip]
The lore will of course emphasise different things based on a given author or editorial or corporate line or audience zeitgeist. Chris Peach did a recent video on Commissars and I was reminded that back in 2E they didn't do the battlefield execution thing and then did in 3E.

Just read a fluff piece in the RT Compilation of a commissar executing a shellshocked Ogryn for cowardice and as an example to part of his Cadet cadre. Pretty sure they have always been up for a bit of Emperor's Justice.

The Imperium’s fear of Abominable Intelligence is largely inherited from the Mechanicum.

And it’s questionable if they even have a particularly set definition of where Abominable Intelligence begins and a ‘mere’ Machine Spirit ends.

They certainly know enough to fear it, as they’ve decent records on the Men of Iron and the coming of Old Night. But what they seemingly don’t know is what kicked it all off.

But, one thing we can confidently say about the Kin, is that they’ve seemingly always treated their Ironkin as nothing less than equals.

Not slaves. Not indentured servants. But full and valued members of their society. That isn’t something I think we can ignore as to why the Kin didn’t seem to have any problems with an AI Rebellion. Simply put? There was nothing to really rebel against. No improvement of your lot by refusing to do the dirty jobs, because your fleshy kin were mucking in the same. And even if you were doing a job they literally couldn’t? You were rewarded for it, not simply treated as a particularly fancy tool.

It's sort of telling that the doctrinal response to Old Night wasn't "Treat your AI better" but "Hate and fear and destroy AI at all costs". Human psykers are inherently a potentially world-ending event in and of themselves, AI is not inherently dangerous (as the kin prove) but is treated much worse.

Kind of implies the mechanicus (or at least the Mechanicum before them) knows that humans are so utterly incapable of treating artificial beings as anything other than slaves that their rebellion is inevitable, whereas psykers are given a lot more leeway despite being a greater threat simply because they're human

Charax wrote:
It's sort of telling that the doctrinal response to Old Night wasn't "Treat your AI better" but "Hate and fear and destroy AI at all costs". Human psykers are inherently a potentially world-ending event in and of themselves, AI is not inherently dangerous (as the kin prove) but is treated much worse.

Kind of implies the mechanicus (or at least the Mechanicum before them) knows that humans are so utterly incapable of treating artificial beings as anything other than slaves that their rebellion is inevitable, whereas psykers are given a lot more leeway despite being a greater threat simply because they're human

I do genuinely wonder if treating your psykers better makes them much less of a threat in the same way, and I think it probably does. I think psykers are tolerated only because they are necessary. If the Imperium wasn't reliant on sacrificing psykers to the Astronomicon and on astropaths, would it tolerate psykers at all? I doubt it.

Psykers are no more inherently dangerous than AI in my opinion. The Kin and Tau have AI, many species have psykers.

Leeway for Psykers isn’t equal though.

Some are just bumped off. Some are fed to the Golden Throne. A lucky few are recruited into the Scholasitca Psykana. And an incredibly fortunate handful are born to the Navis Nobilitae, set for a life of pretty decent comfort as Navigators.

As for AI? The Men of Iron turning on Mankind was our downfall. A galaxy spanning species of high technology relegated to Space Chimps Banging Very Fancy Rocks. That’s not exactly a trick you want to risk repeating.

After all, Robots, even if the real world, rarely do stuff mankind can’t. Heavy lifting, mining, going into dangerous areas. We can do that - but sending in a Robot vastly reduces if not eliminates the risk to life and limb. And if there’s one thing the Imperium and by extension the Mechanicus has in spades, is ‘orrid smelly hoomans.

Whack on some nuts and bolts, swap out organs for machine parts here and there and said ‘orrid smell hooman can be made more or less proof against all sorts. At least long enough to get whatever job needs doing done.

MDG just reminding me of the infamous "bio-robots" - i.e. conscripts - the USSR used to clear the roof of Chernobyl back in 1986, a year before RT.. bet that was an influence

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
But, one thing we can confidently say about the Kin, is that they’ve seemingly always treated their Ironkin as nothing less than equals.

Not slaves. Not indentured servants. But full and valued members of their society. That isn’t something I think we can ignore as to why the Kin didn’t seem to have any problems with an AI Rebellion. Simply put? There was nothing to really rebel against. No improvement of your lot by refusing to do the dirty jobs, because your fleshy kin were mucking in the same. And even if you were doing a job they literally couldn’t? You were rewarded for it, not simply treated as a particularly fancy tool.

I'd be cautious about comparisons between the Ironkin and the Men of Iron. Based on what I've read, the Ironkin are fairly unambitious by nature. Presumably their basic programmed personalities are written this way. The Men of Iron, however, apparently did not share this personality trait. Thus, the Men of Iron are - by their very nature - much more likely to be unsatisfied with the sort of circumstances that the Ironkin are in.


I'll add... it would be nice if GW could finally finish the Leagues and get a full-size codex out for them, complete with all sorts of lore information. Unfortunately, there hasn't been any word about when that will happen.

Eumerin wrote:
Thus, the Men of Iron are - by their very nature - much more likely to be unsatisfied with the sort of circumstances that the Ironkin are in.

The extent to which dark age AI grew is also vague - the Speranza AI from Priests of Mars was nihilistic and complex beyond mortal comprehension, uncaring save when motivated by some irritation or amusement and suggested to still be limited in its ability to fully use its knowledge as it carried the technology of the men of gold but seemingly no ability or drive to use it to improve itself.

Unrestricted AIs built by AIs built by AIs of dark age tech would likely have made tau and kin look as sophisticated as Tamagotchi.


As for happy psykers being safe psykers - see the Eldar.

 Flinty wrote:


Just read a fluff piece in the RT Compilation of a commissar executing a shellshocked Ogryn for cowardice and as an example to part of his Cadet cadre. Pretty sure they have always been up for a bit of Emperor's Justice.

Thanks for the note re: the RT commissariat. It's entirely possible that they either didn't mention it during the Red Period for deliberate or non-deliberate reasons, or that Peachy is remembering it wrong, or that it was there in the fluff but not in the mechanics.

There's the whole thread through the HH novels where Chogoris, Prospero, and Baal (or at least Sanguinius) try different kinds of approaches to modifying Imperial doctrine about psykers. Malcador even has a whole conversation where he nags the Khan about assuming everywhere else is like Chogoris. That conversation ends there, but there's no reason we have to take the word of the Emperor or Malcs as definitive either. For all we know the Emperor just does want to become a god and chose to perpetuate monstrosities to get there, or the Priests of Mars just use the threat of abominable intelligence to prop up their own ideology, or one or the other or both could be right, or even all of the above. There might just be as many Chogorises as there are planets where possession lead to an apocalypse; certainly the 30k Space Wolves prattle on about psykers from Fenris somehow not being like others (why anyone believes them is another story). Or it might be that there are more planets where exterminatus was deployed than there are ones where possession lead to an apocalypse. We don't have a definitive answer.

With all of that being said, even if the most hair-raising tales of Imperial ideology are true, the Tau Empire started spacefaring about M37. So they've been floating around at less than Imperial warp-speed for about 4000 years, while the Age of Strife lasted 5000. In those 5000 years it's quite clear there were still enormous numbers of human-controlled worlds where SOME semblance of life continued (however immisserated, but that's also just true of Imperial worlds) given that the great crusade reabsorbed so many, whether via conquest or diplomacy. The Tau, going much slower given the lack of warp drives, just aren't that big. So they're either sitting on time bombs where they're unprepared for a psychic apocalypse, or they've got their own forms of control, or they're leaving pre-existing infrastructure in place, or their policy gives the lie to Imperial doctrine. All of those seem plausible,

I seem to recall that in late third or early 4th edition, when tehy created optional rules for minor psychic powers, kroot shapers could buy them, which suggests that the studio, at least at the time, thought Kroot had at least some psychic connection.

EDIT: it was actually in the Kroot Army List from late third edition, that the master Shaper (their HQ) could buy minor psychic powers off the table.

Oh man- cool plot idea. I'd love to see the SoS come for the Guev'sa psyker and have their Tau allies rally around them.

There will come a day when I try to kitbash a Guev'sa team- just need to swap heads and feet on Tau models, as I figure Guev'sa could wear Fire Warrior armour.

There's an FW model whose hat looks distinctly Tau if I remember correctly.

 Haighus wrote:

This assumes that the Imperial methods for psyker control are the only method or even effective at all. Given the Imperium tends to generate most of its own problems, I would not be at all surprised if its draconian approach to psykers is actually counterproductive and makes psykers more dangerous.

Psychic powers (and the Warp) are effected by emotions. Mass paranoia and bigoted witch hunts plausibly destablise the local warpspace, attract warp predators, and cause psykers emotional distress that destabilises their powers.

Basically, don't take the Imperium's propaganda at face value. Lots of human worlds survived Old Night, plenty of them retained psyker traditions.

I don't remember the exact source (maybe the 3rd / 4th edition BRB?), but IIRC it's stated that a big problem helping to fuel / throughout Old Night was that very permissive / rights driven societies were effectively wiped out by psykers falling prey to demons. Where as those that survived were the ones that bypassed rights / said they had none, and rapidly disposed of them and kept doing so.

I believe this was also narration rather than an in-universe document. And while there are obviously exceptions, it seems pretty cut-and-dry that psykers are a massive and dangerous problem even in utter utopias.

I think context is important as well though. Human Psykers did exist prior to the Age of Strife just not in large numbers.

The increased size of the psychic population twinned with an increasingly unstable Warp (thank you Aeldari sex cults) is why those problems got as bad as they did.

Had the Aeldari not messed everything up, humanity likely would have evolved along the same path as the pointy ears with a fairly stable psychic society.

A.T. wrote:
As for happy psykers being safe psykers - see the Eldar.

...psykers using runes and wraithbone as circuit breakers, you mean?

I would presume that the T'au, if they do have any number of human psykers in their population, have been lucky enough not to have any of them go nuclear. Yet.

Because if and when that does occur, realistically it will doom them. If an Omega+ class psyker gets born in T'au space and loses control(which is the most likely thing to happen without them knowing proper containment and training), it would destroy the T'au Empire. This won't happen because of their plot armor of course, but if we ignore that then it is a ticking time bomb. The only saving grace is that due to the low population of psychic races within the T'au empire the chance of a psyker being born is very very low.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I would presume that the T'au, if they do have any number of human psykers in their population, have been lucky enough not to have any of them go nuclear. Yet.

Because if and when that does occur, realistically it will doom them. If an Omega+ class psyker gets born in T'au space and loses control(which is the most likely thing to happen without them knowing proper containment and training), it would destroy the T'au Empire. This won't happen because of their plot armor of course, but if we ignore that then it is a ticking time bomb. The only saving grace is that due to the low population of psychic races within the T'au empire the chance of a psyker being born is very very low.

How many Omega+ Pyskers exist? In the whole galaxy?

It's a ticking time bomb, maybe. But a lot less than the Nids are, for example.