Some psychic powers are in effect a ranged attack, ie Fire Bolt. Can you dodge such attacks?

Yesterday I ruled no because the Fire Bolt is not a BS attack but WP ... the psykers uses his will and intent to launch it and this makes the attack too fast to dodge. Would this make a difference?

ps sorry posted this thing in the House Rules by mistake

Good question! I ruled yes yesterday, a warlock was slinging force bolts at the players.

I do think, you raise a valid point with the WP vs BS, but I just see the psychic powers as projectiles coming towards the players. Not all powers can be dodged of course, but bio lightning, force bolt, and fire bolt can be dodged at least in my campaign.

The main reason for my ruling is probably, because I can see the main guy in my campaign get hit by four force bolts and just die, yes I can just fake his wounds, and say he still stands, but I prefer to say he nimbly dodges out of the way

I guess in the end the answer is a matter of preference for the GM, I just wanted to give my house rule.

I have not found anything in the books, but then again I am also to lazy to look...

Buyman

Thanks, I think I am leaning towards your interpretation too now ... too bad for my player who has a critical chest wound because of an undodgeable Fire Bolt

Yeah I would reason the same thing. Unless the power leads you to the belief that you can't dodge it, I would say you get the dodge test.

Here is one biggie though, powers dont get range or aiming bonuses so on the powers that need you to test WP to hit, your are less effective then if you used a rifle.

Thoughts on this? My groups psycher is having a problem justifying the use of some of the powers because he has a long lass that with unnatural aim, short range, red dot laser sight, and full round aim gives him a +60 to hit and with accurate he can easily deal 3d10 damage which will often out do psychic power damages (not all the time, I know some hit very hard)

Thoughts, opinions, solutions?

Hmmm ... maybe you should not allow penalties either, then. If the psychic power does not receive an Aim or short range bonus, then it should not be penalized as well for range or fog and so on.

Especially if the power uses WP instead of BS.

The Laughing God said:

I agree with the no bonusses and no penalties, except for cover, also I would rather dodge one single lasblast than several seperate bolts. I had written a lengthy reply concerning the damage output over several rounds of the long las example vs several force bolts. You sound so smart Buyman, I thought until I factored the armour and toughness into the equation...Buyman you really should have finished 2. grade, that is what I am thinking now

So in the end I went with the dodge answer

Buyman

I strongly disagree.

1. Psycic Powers do not get the benefits of range or technology. No point blank range, no red-dot, accurate,+ aiming force bolt. This means most powers are only going to have 40-60% hit chance at their limited ranges.
2. Threshold. Even before a roll to hit, the powers threshold must be met, offering yet another miss chance.
3. Perils of the warp. For most weapons, jamming is an inconvenence, not a major catastrophe. While on the subject, the frequency and severity of a perils role make it a less than desirable attack method.

Additionally it makes dodge/agility the ultimate defense. If you are considering any sort of additionally penalty to psychers I would recommend something other than agility/dodge. Making it Psyniscience could offer a 1/2 perception evasion for everyone with an edge to adepts and psychers; which would offset the penalty with a benefit.

As for a lucky Threshold roll destroying a major villian, burn a fate point, problem solved.

Woah, I think your a bit over zealous on that note.

Lets look at this logically for a second, why wouldn't they get range bonuses? Ignore balance reasons for the moment and lets just think about the most important part, the meat of what the powers do. Wouldn't it be easier to hit some one 2m away with a force bolt as apposed to 50m? Or is the general assumption that all psychic powers are fly by wire missles?

Now I personally think that the projectile like attack powers may get a range bonus because yes, it would be easier to hit them if they are closer even with mind bullets. It would be harder for the psycher to project his power over a longer distance then a short one, we all understand that and it's even built into the mechanics of most powers (OB adding extra range).

If not just building it into the base mechanics, what about a talent?

Psychic Ranging. 200xp

WP 40, Psy Rating 3+, Psyscience +10, Awareness +10

Powers you manifest that require WP tests to hit now benefit from range modifiers due to your increased perception and understand of the Warp and it's flow.

What do people think? Pro's? Con's? Can a theory machiner tear into this and give us something to compare it to, like the long las again?

The problem does not lie with a Flame Bolt or Force Bolt... frankly speaking those things really really dont do that much damage.

Unlike... DnD for example Dark Heresy does not have some sort of reflex against area effects. Against grenades for example you either have the agility to dodge or you dont!

What happens though when your Rank 6 Pyro Psycher gets his hands on Fire Storm? You have a relatively easy power to pull off with a huge possible damage output! Even with the reduced potency of Corpus Corvention from the Errata at the hands of someone rolling 4 dice and with a WP bonus of 5 even if you dont have discipline mastery you do an average of 3d10+5 dmg (power roll of 5.5 per die for a total of 22 +5 WP)! With invocation make that 4d10+5 for a whooping 27 dmg average and unlike a gun shot or whatever else it affects EVERYONE in 6 meters radius (ie 12 meter diametre!!!).

For me it doesnt get much more broken than that! Imagine that most daemons even big ones would die from this! Since their daemonic Toughness does not apply against dmg from psychic powers! so a bunch of plagueabearers with 5 tb would end up with 22 wounds from a single attack leaving most of them at 2 critical! furies and dispayres would be instantly destroyed with their measly 15 wounds and TB 4 as they would suffer 23 wounds and go to 8 critical!

So with an average roll... 1 psycher in 1 round kills daemons. Sweet... and totally unrealistic...

Unfortunately thats how the rules are written and unless psychic powers get Erratad to allow dodges or something to that effect... well... I will simply dread when my psycher player reaches Power 6.

arcona said:

Er, is there a more realistic way of handling psychic powers killing demons ? Just curious... and bing a bit of an ass to boot. ;-)

For handling dodges, how about if the PC's can conceivably see that an attack is about to come his way, he can dodge? That's how I handle things in my game and it seems to work. The PC sees a guy swinging the barrel of his gun to bear on said PC; knowing what the next thing about to happen mostly likely is,m he dives out of the way... dodge! A crazy looking fella is looking at him in an odd way. Suddenly, everything around him bursts into flames (no dodge unless he makes it a habit of ducking every time someone looks at him funny).

On Biolighting, that one was never dogable in my game. Going off of how electricity and lighting connects, it's not a charge that arcs from point a seeking point b. It only occurs once a charged bath between point a and b is established. In my game, the psyker making the power roll makes that connection. It doesn't matter what the target dose from that point as the airs already charged up and where ever he goes (in that half a second), the electrical connection between him and the psyker has been made and it will be electrified.

Another thing to consider with other powers, especially those that use WP for the To Hit. If the psyker has to Will a fire bolt to hit target A, why would target A's position relative to the psyker (as long as nothing's between the two) matter to the psyker? If his will to hit target A is the deciding factor, it isn't a line up your sights and fire a projectile, it's a think a firebolt into that guy hard enough situation. Seems like that could alter it's course and otherwise home in on the target. Never mind that when he's willing a fire bolt into someone, the Warp is strongly involved and the Warp has a long history of not giving a **** about a things location in real space, time, logic, or causality.

In the end, I just fall back on, if the PC would naturally duck out of the way from an attack, they can dodge it, if they wouldn't naturally **** out of the way, they can't. As most ranged attacks move faster then the human body can move, the one dodging would have to know that an attack was coming or at least highly probable 9or have a long history of ducking from kids with sticks, people looking at him funny, fingers pointed at him, etc).

There's nothing in the rules to support dodging psychic power attacks. Sure, Firestorm can be nasty, but you get armor and toughness bonus against it and aren't likely to kill everyone in a single shot with it (even at Psi Rating 6) if the enemy is armored and tough (a rank 4 guardsman can have upwards of 18 wounds, even with regular flack armor and a TB of 3, even at 4d10+5 you'll need high numbers to put him out for good, and even then, that's less damage than an autogun on full auto at the same level and no chance of psychic phenomina and you need to be well higher than rank 4 to snag Psi6). Remember, Plaguebearers are slotted as what threat, Minoris? If you want the honest answer of how to deal with area affect psyker powers, it's not dumb them down, it's make the quarters more cramped so they can't use them without risk of bbqing their own party, or even themselves.

What power IS deadly as soon as your pyromancer picks it up is Holocaust, as the odds are pretty good, NOTHING within a 6meter radius of said psycher survives and that's only after 1 round, where most PC's will be able to fire it for 2+ without dying themselves if they're able to get in the first shot.

In the end, MOST psychic powers do not do as much damage as a standard autogun in the hands of someone skilled in its use, and a weapon jam is far less likely to mess your world up than psychic phenomina.

There are now 2 posts of the exact same topic, one here and one in House Rules but I'll say the same thing here.

The rules specifically list what attacks can be dodged and psychic powers are not part of this list, thusly they may not be dodged. That's pretty obvious, they didn't forget to add them, they never inteded to because you can't dodge them.

Also yet again, WP test to do their effects... that is not an attack roll and thusly can't be even considered dodgeble by the dodge skill and action text.

One more thing, in the same vein, you also cannot Emp Fury on a psychic attack as it's not a weapon skill or ballistic skill test.

For the cramped quarters its not really an issue. A Pyro Psycher with Psy-Rating 4, perception over 35 and intelligence over 40 can estimate exactly where his power will reach and how much space it will take up.

in some cases I did ask him for a logic test to make sure he calculates it right but still...

and no, an autogun will not do more dmg in full auto for 1 basic reason. Each shot counts against Toughness and Armor... so you may get 5 hits but all of them will have to fight the high toughness and armor you mentioned! The firestorm is one big batch...

for the record, with incantation and a WP bonus of 5 the psycher in our group deals 25+ dmg relatively regularly... I dont see how a standard guard with his Armor 3, Toughness 7 survives this. And even if he does survive he is in the criticals and he has caught fire...

karn987 said:

That is a very good point, and after looking at a number of powers, many manifest without a willpower test at all, only a few would even require a willpower roll, like flame bolt and force bolt, so even in the most liberal of interpretation would not be dodgiable.

If the problem is too much damage for specific (or even a handful of powers), don't fix it by radically altering the entire game mechanic, simply increase the threshold or overbleed requirement for the problem powers.

Agent.0.Fortune said:

Exactly, I know I have modded the Threshold and overbleed on several powers in my game to either make them slightly more useful or bring them down a bit because they really do widely vary.

Another thing you could do is great some super special gear for the badies that may make it harder for the psycher for example. I had a bad guy with a device inside him that made powers manifested on him suffer a -5 to their PT roll, it also made him essentially a psychic null but it did the job I wanted which was to make him subtly harder to deal with because they couldn't use their fallback plan and let the psycher blow him away.

The guardsman actually wouldn't catch fire, no where under firestorm does it say that they must make an agility test or catch fire, unlike every other fire based weapon (and several other fire based psychic attacks). And yes, a conscript guardsman would be fodder against a powerful psyker flinging around fire balls, a guardsman of equal xp value however, would not be instant-fodder (having higher armor, toughness bonus, and double or more their starting wounds). And yes, an autogun with manstopper rounds (or dumdum rounds if the opponent is unarmored), can do equivalent or better with no chance of psychic backlash, and chances for emperor's fury to add to that, plus appropriate bonus damage talents like mighty shot.

As for close quarters? If he has room to put the fireball so that it only hits the enemy, that's not close quarters. That particular power has a 6 meter radius (we're talking almost a 40ft diameter blast). I couldn't safely use that ability in any room in my house without getting myself, I'd have trouble firing it off in the cafeteria in the school I work at and not catching fireball backblast. In the open, yeah, it's devestating, so is a well placed pair of the mark 3 frag grenades. If you're allowing him to modify how much space his blast is going to take up, that's not the power being too much, because the power doesnt say up to 6 meter radius, it always is one.

If you want to get creative with baddies, start giving out Mental Fortress, opposed willpower tests or take damage when you use a psychic power on them. The occasional Null works well too, and it wouldn't be hard to gimmick up a psychic hood for this game (opposed willpower roll to negate a power that would affect you).

addendum to my last post, I totally somehow missed the part under pyromancy main header that says basically all the damage powers under it make folks have a chance of catching fire.

The Laughing God said:

By the rules you can only dodge attacks, the powers that require some sort of roll to hit all have you testing WP to hit and thusly are not attacks and are infact tests.

I see your forgetting the errata that psychic actions take up your attack action for your turn, thus making them attacks. See how I can take a rule and make assumptions about it too? There is no rule that specifically says psychic attacks cannot be dodged, so don't make the assumption based on the description of the dodge skill.

In general, every time there is an action that you can't take, it is described in the text.

Seriously, your going to justify not being able to dodge because they use WP to control if they hit with a Psychic attack? They do still roll to hit, thus making it an attack roll. Thus making it dodgeable. I don't give in to this realism crap about its being manifested at the speed of thought so how can you dodge....this is a scifi/fantasy game where you can dodge bullets, wield chain blades and fight demons from another dimension....

As for powers like firestorm, my group has always treated it like a grenade. You can dodge, but if its centered on you, you'll need a fairly high Ag bonus to be able to get out of the area of effect. Not sure if that is how the rules were intended for area "spells" but it works for us.

Emprah_Horus said:

lol wow nice try but no.

I did not forget the errata and all that did was balance the rules and make the combats flow easier, it did not make pyschic powers an attack. It is still not an attack because it is not defined as an attack anywhere in the rules. In order for it to be an attack, it must state that it is an attack right? Yes it counts as the same action slot, but that does not make it an attack as far as what modifies it are concerned.

Also dodge states exactly what can be dodged and as I have already said, this does not include psychic powers in the listing unless you have a book stating differently then mine.

Also Horus they do not roll to hit, that is very very clear . They TEST WP which is a different thing all together by the rules and wording of the game. Thus not making it an attack and thusly not making it dodgable by the strict rules. Read the rules before you post next time. Also everyone uses them how best you think to, there were no assumptions made. The text very clearly states how it works, all you are doing now is being a child about this. You have no substantial points to back up what your saying. Since dodge specifically states what it can dodge then that is how you determine what can be dodged, by what is listed.

Its very simple, if it's not on the list then it can't be dodged.

A test is not an attack, the rules make the distrinction quite clearly and each is effected by differently.

Your point about it taking up an attack action is fair, but manifesting is still not an attack by the rules. It is a different. " Making a Focus Power Action" (note how it clearly defines it as a Focus Power Action and not an attack) "is the psychic equivalent of a standard attack action, and counts as such for the purpose of determining what else a psyker can do in a round." Pg 9 errata 3.0 There, it says very clearly that is counts as one for the purposes of determining what else you can do in a round. It does not state anything else and thusly it is only for that one purpose.

I'll just agree to disagree on this one. A normal attack is a WS or BS test but also categorized as an attack. The wordsmithing you are doing is just semantics. A WP test to hit is the same as a WS/BS test to hit. It is still a test that determines whether or not your attack succeeds, thus making it an attack roll whether psychic or physical.

Emprah_Horus said:

You still don't get around the statement of what a dodge is allowed to dodge. Which is one incoming BS or WS

Dodge:

"You may use the Dodge skill once per round to negate a successful hand-to-hand or ranged attack." Page 101 DH core book.

Even beyond that, the errata says that a psychic manifestation counts as an attack, specifically to determine what else a psyker can do that round. Otherwise, Focus Power is a Miscellaneous Action, and not an Attack Action, according to the chart on page 189. That's pretty clear to me.

Please illustrate to me where a psychic manifestation is considered a successful hand-to-hand or ranged attack. I'll say straight out that Holocaust has no such statement. Neither does Fire Storm, and only Fire Bolt could be technically be considered a "ranged attack", and only if you rules lawyer the hell out of it and argue that an individual power breaks the paradigm of psychic power manifestation.

So basically, your argument is that you're a rules lawyer, and instead of looking at the surrounding, pertinent rules and drawing guidelines from those, you yourself actually engage in wordsmithing to justify an interpretation of the rules.

Which is fine. Probably not what the game designers had in mind, but let's face it, rules-lawyers are a fact of life in RPGs.

My solution to the rules lawyer is to usually use the justification immediately on the rules lawyer in game. If the hero can dodge a psychic manifestation, so can my BBEG, and you can bet your sweet tush that I'll min/max his ability to get the hell out of the way of the nuke that the psychic sets off.

As a GM, I am just as capable of using anything the players come up with as they are. The more creative you are, the tougher your enemies are.

TheFlatline said:

You obviously haven't read any of my posts where I do not pretend to know the rules. I am not a rules lawyer although I do expect players in any game I am in to follow the rules unless a house rule has overrided them. At the end of the day though, it is up to the GM and players interpretation of the game world and the mechanics as a whole. I have never said I believe you can dodge all psychic powers, nor do I believe some are dodgeable. But powers like firebolt and force bolt which are projetiles even if they are not an official "ranged-attack" should be dodgeable. They don't travel any faster than a las bolt and yes, if a ruling is made in a certain way, of course the BBEG gets to follow the same rules. I am a firm believer in anything the players can do the bad guys can do, so don't try and put me into the category of min/max, rules lawyers. I am merely stating my interpretation of the rules.

No one here knows what the game designers had in mind, if we did there wouldn't be such a wide range of rules interpretations out there. My group plays for the richness of the 40k background and love to live out the story. For us its not a players vs GM thing. I honestly believe that there are a lot of psychic powers that aren't attacks, but the few that are, unless stated otherwise, should be dodgeable. Like I said before, we treat firestorm like a grenade, most people don't have the ag bonus to get out of the way even if they are successful at dodging. Psychic blade, its a blade that is no wider than a molecule, dodging should not be allowed unless it is somehow visible (ie. covered in blood), even then would require a very difficult awareness check.

I am not being unreasonable, nor am I the one that keeps quoting the official Dodge skill out of the book, so please refrain from casting your judgement, especially when you admit you will min/max a bad guy to punish a rules lawyer. I am not trying to change your minds, just trying to state my opinion for the OP to make their own judgement based on the opposing arguments here.

Given that no modifiers apply to Psychic Powers (other than those stated by individual powers) I'd say no, you don't get to dodge them.