A Flaw with The Psychic Phase!

Nick speaking,

Well, maybe not a flaw from Games Workshop's point of view, as the the Psychic phase works absolutely fine when you are playing one on one or two on two games, but what about when you are playing three or four way games?

It's fair to say that GW have taken multi player games into account before, with missions like 'Battle at the Camp', but has GW now totally abandoned this type of fun play in 7th Edition? Or did they just forget about it! I play four way games quite often with my buddies, and we always have a blast with them, but we are now having trouble working out the best way to do Deny the Witch?

As it stands, player A rolls a dice and adds that number to his mastery level, as do all the other players, but who Denies the Witch? Surely, all players cannot, as that will just overpower the Psyker! OK, so lets say only the player that the target unit's army is from can Deny, well yes, that's fine, but what if it is a blessing? Maybe the closest person to play A?

Maybe the highest Mastery level should roll the Deny roll, but then he may try to not dispel a power if he knows it may benefit him somehow! What about going back to the old ways of 6th Edition as an option, where you cannot Deny a blessing, but have Perils on double ones and sixes again, and maybe using the current Perils chart?

Have any of you come across this problem? What are your 'House Rules' to solve it?

Read more ...

Warlock Psychic Power Markers!

Nick speaking,

With my determination to keep the Seer Council in my Saim-Hann list for now, I need to figure out a way to keep track of all those powers. Although I would love to have little discrete magnetised markers of some sort, I am as yet, still not convinced of the future of the Seer Council in my army, so I came up with this template of markers, just to get me going. Please feel free to contact me if you would like a copy of the template. Saim-Hann battle report to follow...

Read more ...

Reading 6th Edition - Psychic disciplines

Nick speaking,

There are five Psychic Power Disciplines that Psykers are able to Generate powers from. Armies are limited to which disciplines they can use, if any at all. The five Disciplines are, Biomancy, Divination, Pyromancy, Telekinesis and Telepathy. Within each Psychic Discipline are six powers, which are randomly chosen, with the quantity equal to your Mastery level of your Psyker. If you have two or more disciplines to choose from, you are able to mix your random powers from any of the Disciplines you can take.

The powers in each Discipline all have different abilities, as you would expect, with most of them being pretty useful. Each discipline also has a Primaris Power, which is a fixed power that you are able to swap your randomly generated power for, if you should so wish. You can only do this once, per Discipline, but it does at least let you drop any power you roll that you think might not be useful to you. As we discussed in the Psykers post, each power takes up a certain amount of Warp Charge when you use it.

If a Psyker rolls the same power twice, you must re-roll until you roll a different power, although it is possible for two different Psykers to have the same power in one army. I will let you pick the bones out of whatever Psychic Disciplines and Powers are available to your armies, but personally, I think I will wait until I have a good few games under my belt before I start to experiment. I am still not convinced that swapping fixed powers, that you know how to use, like Doom and Fortune, for some randomly generated powers that are going to be different each game, but I have to say, I am liking the Divination powers...

The Psychic powers themselves are categorised to make it easy to know when the power actually happens. The categories are known as, Blessing (start of the movement phase and friendly models gain), Witchfire (shooting attack), Focussed Witchfire (Shooting attack that hits individual models), Beam (shooting attack using a line), Malediction (start of the movement phase, weakens your enemy with no line of sight needed, even in if in close combat) and Nova (Shooting attack that automatically hits all enemy units, even in if in close combat). Obviously, most of the powers listed will only last for that turn and not the whole game, unless you re-cast the power... 

Biomancy

Primaris Power: Smite
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
12" S4 AP2 A4

1 - Iron Arm
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker gains +D3 Strength and Toughness and gains Eternal Warrior

2 - Enfeeble
Malediction, Warp Charge 1
Enemy unit within 24", -1 Strength and Toughness and treat all terrain as difficult

3 - Endurance
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
One friendly unit within 24" gains Feel no Pain, It will not Die and Relentless

4 - Life Leech
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
12" S6 AP2 A2

5 - Warp Speed
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker gain +D3 to Initiative and Attacks, and gains the Fleet Special rule

6 - Haemorrhage
Focussed Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
12" Toughness test, no armour or cover saves allowed, if dead, randomly select another model within 2" (Friend or foe), if that one is slain, continue the process until the test is saved

Divination

Primaris Power: Prescience
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
12" target unit can re-roll all failed to hit rolls

1 - Foreboding
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker and unit has Counter Assault and shoot Overwatch at normal ballistic skill

2 - Forewarning
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
12" target unit has 4++ save

3 - Misfortune
Malediction, Warp Charge 1
24" one enemy unit re-rolls all successful saves

4 - Perfect Timing
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker and units weapons ignore cover special rule

5 - Precognition
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
The Psyker can re-roll all failed to hit and wound rolls, as well as saves

6 - Scrier's Gaze
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Roll three dice and chose the result you want when rolling for reserves, Outflank and Mysterious terrain

Pyromancy

Primaris Power: Flame Breath
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
Template S5 AP4 A1 Soul Blaze

Soul Blaze:
If the unit suffers one or more unsaved wound, at the end of each turn roll a D6, On a three or less the flames die out, on a four or more the flames continue. The unit takes D3 S4 AP5 hits. The wounds are allocated by the controlling player and cover saves are not allowed

1 - Fiery Form
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker gains 4++ save and +2 strength, his close combat attacks are Soul Blaze

2 - Fire Shield
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
One friendly unit has a 4+ cover save from shooting attacks, plus a form of Hammer and Wrath

3 - Inferno
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
24" S4 AP5 A1, Soul Blaze, Blast, Ignores cover

4 - Spontaneous Combustion
Focussed Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
18" target model suffers a wound with no armour or cover saves allowed, if dead, has an extra Blast attack

5 - Sunburst
Nova, Warp Charge 1
6" S4 AP5 Assault 2D6, Blind, Ignores cover

Blind:
Any unit hit by a blind weapon must take an initiative test, if failed, all models in the unit are reduced to weapon skill and ballistic kill one

6 - Molten Beam
Beam, Warp Charge 1
12" S8 AP1 A1, Melta

Telekinesis

Primaris Power: Assail
Beam, Warp Charge 1
18" S6 AP- A1, Strikedown

Strikedown:
Any model that suffers one or more unsaved wounds or passes one or more saving throws from this attack. They will half their Initiative and move as if in difficult terrain. Vehicles and monstrous Creature are immune

1 - Crush
Focussed Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
18" 2D6, target receives a hit equal to result rolled, if more than ten rolled auto wound or penetrating hit

2 - Gate of Infinity
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
Psyker and unit can move via deep strike up to 24"

3 - Objuration Mechanticum
Malediction, Warp Charge 1
24" one target unit must re-roll to hit ans wound rolls of a six, vehicles are hit with a Strength 1 Haywire hit

4 - Shockwave
Nova, Warp Charge 1
12" S3 AP- Assault D6, Pinning

5 - Telekine Dome
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
12" friendly unit has a 5++ against shooting attacks, every save is deflected back to any unengaged unit with 6"

6 - Vortex of Doom
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
12" S10 AP1 H1, Blast which will hurt the Psyker also if he fails his Psychic test.

Telepathy

Primaris Power: Psychic Shriek
Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
12" Roll 3D6 and subtract targets leadership, a number of wounds are received equal to the result with no armour or cover saves allowed

1 - Dominate
Malediction, Warp Charge 1
24" One unit must pass a leadership test each time it moves, shoots, runs or assaults or they do nothing

2 - Mental Fortitude
Blessing, Warp Charge 1
24" One friendly unit that is falling back automatically regroups and gains the fearless special rule

3 - Puppet Master
Focussed Witchfire, Warp Charge 1
24" The target shoots at one of it's own forces, but not into his own unit

4 - Terrify
Malediction, Warp Charge 1
24" Loses the Fearless Special rule if it has it, and treats all enemy units as having the Fear Special rule

5 - Invisibility
Blessing, Warp Charge 2
24" Friendly unit has Shrouded and Stealth Special rule. if the unit charges, enemy cannot make use of Counter Assault and are at Weapon Skill one

6 - Hallucination
Malediction, Warp Charge 2
24" One enemy unit suffers one of the following hallucinations...

1-2 - Bugs! I hate bugs!
Unit is pinned unless they ignore it or are locked in close combat

3-4 - Ermmm?
The unit cannot shoot, run declare charges or strike blows in close combat

5-6 - You! You're a Traitor!
Every model inflicts a single hit on his own unit, resolved at that models own strengths, but using the strength bonuses, AP values and special rules of their most powerful close combat weapons if they have any

Lastly in this series, fluff... and other!

Previous Posts:
6th Edition Rule Book Unboxing
Reading 6th Edition - The first few pages
Reading 6th Edition - The movement phase
Reading 6th Edition - The shooting phase
Reading 6th Edition - The assault phase
Reading 6th Edition - Universal Special Rules
Reading 6th Edition - Independent Character
Reading 6th Edition - Unit types
Reading 6th Edition - Weapons 
Reading 6th Edition - Characters & Challenges
Reading 6th Edition - Psykers
Reading 6th Edition - Vehicle basics
Reading 6th Edition - Vehicle types
Reading 6th Edition - Terrain
Reading 6th Edition - Your army & Allies
Reading 6th Edition - Missions

Read more ...

Reading 6th Edition - Psykers

Nick speaking,

Right, now onto Psykers, and this is the page that the built in book mark is on when you first get the book, very interesting! Psykers now have different levels from 1-4 or very rarely, even more. A Psykers Mastery level is usually one, unless it states otherwise in their Codex entry. In an older Codex the level is worked out by how many powers they can use. Psykers that do not need 'Warp Charge' to use their powers, like an Eldar Shadowseer, have a Psyker Mastery level of zero...

Warp Charge:
Each Mastery level grants the Psyker a single Warp Charge per turn. Each turn a Psyker will automatically genrerate Warp Charges equal to their level, just make a note or use a counter to keep track of how many Warp Charges you use, any unused Warp Charges are lost at the end of the turn. This is just a way to keep track of the powers you have used, and it is worth noting that some powers can use more than one Warp Charge.

When using a Warp Charge to manifest a Psychic power, and the power requires a target, unless otherwise stated, the Psyker must have line of sight to this target. This means embarked Psykers can only target themselves and there unit or the transport they are in. Likewise, a Psyker outside a transport cannot target a unit inside a transport...

Psychic tests are done exactly as before, except when you have a Perils of the Warp wound, the wound is taken with no saves of any kind allowed. Interesting wording for Eldar, their Farseers Ghosthelm ability just prevent the Perils of the Warp attack from happening on a roll of 3+, it is not an actual save of a wound, so I assume it still works? There is nothing in the new FAQ that clarifies that though.

'Deny the Witch'
If a Psychic power is generated and used on a target, the target is able to attempt to Deny the Witch. Roll a D6, on a result of a six the power is nullified. If you have one or more Psykers in the target unit the pass result can be improved. If a target psyker has a Mastery level equal or less than the attacker, you pass the roll on a 5+, if the target Psyker has a Mastery level higher than the attacker, you pass the roll on a 4+.

'Psychic Hood'
A model with a Psychic hood is able to help a friendly unit when being targeted with a Psychic attack. He is able to do a 'Deny the Witch' roll for any model or unit within 6" of himself, regardless if he is joined with that unit or not.

There are many types of powers that determine when a power is used and what condition it needs to work. If a power does not have a type, it will be clearly expressed in its entry. Here are the categories listed and a very basic description of them...

Blessing:
Powers that are done at the start of the movement phase. They grant extra abilities to the Psykers allies, such as character boosts and abilities, even if they are locked in combat.

Conjuration:
Powers that are done at the start of the movement phase. They allow a specific number of units to be conjured on the battlefield via deep strike.

Malediction:
Powers that are done at the start of the movement phase. They have the ability to target a unit to reduce the unit's abilities, even if they are locked in combat.

Witchfire:
Powers that are done during shooting phase. Also known as Psychic shooting attacks, some of these attacks will be listed with a sub-type category with different restriction...

'Beam'
Drawing a 1mm thick line the same as a Space Wolves Jaws of the Wolf power.

'Focused Witchfire'
The same as Witchfire, but you are able to target a single model in a unit.

'Maelstrom'
A power that automatically targets and hits any friendly and enemy units that are in range.

'Nova'
A power that automatically targets and hits any enemy units that are in range.

The new Psychic Discipline rules are right at the back of the book, so we will come to them in a future post.

Previous Posts:
6th Edition Rule Book Unboxing
Reading 6th Edition - The first few pages
Reading 6th Edition - The movement phase
Reading 6th Edition - The shooting phase
Reading 6th Edition - The assault phase
Reading 6th Edition - Universal Special Rules
Reading 6th Edition - Independent Character
Reading 6th Edition - Unit types
Reading 6th Edition - Weapons 
Reading 6th Edition - Characters & Challenges

Next up, vehicles...

Read more ...

Eldar Psychic Markers

Nick speaking,

A few posts ago I asked my followers for some ideas for Doom, Guide and Fortune markers, to take the place of my Photoshop paper versions. I received some great ideas including making an information booth for a fortune marker.

One person though, really caught my attention with his great marker ideas. And I would like to say a big thank you to BigGrim for sharing them with me, and allowing me to share them with you also. So without further ado, here are his three markers...

'Doom' marker made from the new Tomb Banshee model...

'Guide' made from High Elf Archer pointing...

'Fortune' made from a High Elf Mage with orb...

I really love the simplistic way he has painted them, they are still eye catching and the bases really work well at making them stand out. I think I am going to seriously consider using his ideas for my own markers in the future.

You can check out more of BigGrim's stuff here on his Plog

Read more ...

Guide, Doom and Fortune - Markers?

Nick speaking,

How do you remember where all your Eldar psychic powers are?

At the moment I use some token marker that I made up in Photoshop, nothing fancy, but when laminated and cut up they work pretty well at reminding me, and my opponent, where my Guide, Fortune and Doom powers are. I find them very handy, and I can have as many tokens as I need. Here are the markers I currently use and how they look on the table...

Although my markers are great, I am just wondering if I could come up with something a bit better! I am thinking of an actual model marker on a base of some description, but the question is what to use? I did see a very old Eldar model with a musical instrument once on eBay that looked interesting, but that was just a one off and it was just a single model. I would have to have at least three of each marker for when I am using both Eldrad and a normal Farseer in the same list!

I am sure that there must be a whole bunch of people out there that have come up with some cool ideas for this, so does anyone out there want to share them with me please! Full credit and link back for the best suggestions.

Read more ...