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I find it really annoying that psychic denial range is determined by the caster and not the target. ESP when some psychic powers have a cast range of 24 or more...Essentially with psykers almost always playing a back feild support role - psychic denial almost never happens. It is far too easy to measure your opponents deny range and just stay out of it.

Just a proposal to make denying a power an actual possibility early in the game.

-When determining the range of a psychic denial - use the target rather than the caster for measure. What do you think?

Certainly. It would also be nice if there was a stat associated with casting and denying to models could specialize in those tasks independently.

 LunarSol wrote:
Certainly. It would also be nice if there was a stat associated with casting and denying to models could specialize in those tasks independently.

There are already a few models with bonuses associated with either cast only or deny only; I don't have the Daemons book to hand but I know Greyfax is running around with +1 to deny.

I can support the idea of needing to be in range of the target or caster to deny but the range should also be shorter. 18" i think. 2 ft is pretty big.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
Certainly. It would also be nice if there was a stat associated with casting and denying to models could specialize in those tasks independently.

There are already a few models with bonuses associated with either cast only or deny only; I don't have the Daemons book to hand but I know Greyfax is running around with +1 to deny.

Maybe he means some units have increased deny range. For example. Maybe a LOC should be able to deny at 36" or something.

Personally I just find denial to heavily favor a defender. Who already has a giant advantage over an army that is trying to push to get close to a gun line. It's not much of an issue with 2 armies that both want to get close.

 Xenomancers wrote:
I find it really annoying that psychic denial range is determined by the caster and not the target. ESP when some psychic powers have a cast range of 24 or more...Essentially with psykers almost always playing a back feild support role - psychic denial almost never happens. It is far too easy to measure your opponents deny range and just stay out of it.

Just a proposal to make denying a power an actual possibility early in the game.

-When determining the range of a psychic denial - use the target rather than the caster for measure. What do you think?

Not strongly opposed to this suggestion, but it would complicate things if we ever started getting psychic powers that didn't have obvious targets. How do you handle psychic powers that don't target units? What about powers that target psykers outside of deny range but essentially grant the psyker an aura that impacts units within deny range? Probably a solvable complicaiton. I'm not a big fan of rules that make it easier to shut down cool effects, but I think your pitch is a reasonable one.

Maybe make it harder to deny powers your opponent caste on themselves but easier to deny if there are more friendly psykers in range (units would only count as 1).

I'm in favour of it being range to the target, but it definitely needs a reduction in range in that case.

Even 12" would still be a pretty big defensive bubble, but make positioning your psykers for both defence and offence a lot more important as you have to balance getting in range of the enemy's juiciest targets, and staying in range to cover your own.

It's because when a deny happens. They aren't putting up a shield protecting the target or a psychic barrier. They are denying the casters connection to the warp. Putting a mental block in place. So it kind of has to be to the caster. Fluff wise what makes more sense. He magically knows where to put up a forcefield to protect a unit that he might not even know where it is. OR He can feel another connection to the warp and when he feels the connection grow stronger he fights back trying to break that connection.

Dunno. Psychic denial is basically useless at this point indeed. On the other hand, psychic phase is so weak at the moment that I don't think it needs another nerf on top of it.

SeanDavid1991 wrote:
It's because when a deny happens. They aren't putting up a shield protecting the target or a psychic barrier. They are denying the casters connection to the warp. Putting a mental block in place. So it kind of has to be to the caster. Fluff wise what makes more sense. He magically knows where to put up a forcefield to protect a unit that he might not even know where it is. OR He can feel another connection to the warp and when he feels the connection grow stronger he fights back trying to break that connection.

This doesn't preclude the rule being based on distance to target; it would surely be easier to sense and unravel psychic power if it is being directed near to your location. It's easy to argue either method on a fluff basis, and it's not really what's important if one is better in gameplay terms.

In range terms 24" to caster vs. 12" to target isn't going to make a big difference mechanically (most powers don't have longer than a 24" range anyway), but in terms of gameplay measuring to the target makes denying powers more tactical as the positioning of your psykers is based on what you want to protect, rather than trying to blanket enemy psykers. The problem really is that measuring to caster is too easily circumvented, as a caster (especially faster psykers on bikes, with wings etc.) can just move out of your deny the witch bubble before manifesting their power(s). Proximity to target however couldn't be circumvented in this way.

It seems clear that the system intended to be based on defensive psykers choosing wisely which powers to use their limited denial attempts against, and attacking psykers attempting to bluff the defender into wasting those attempts early. This works better however when measuring to target, rather than caster, as you can force the attacker to go up against your denial attempts in order to manifest a power against your most valuable targets.