Counteracting Sanctioning

By stilcho, in Dark Heresy

I was wondering if there is some official or quasi-official information on the results of countering or actually reversing the side effects of the Psyker Sanctioning table. In particular the effect that leaves the character with the Chemgeld talent. Now many of the Sanctioning effects do look just like unintentional side effects, but this one I see as having a reason behind it.

Now the character in question happens to have the Dark Soul Talent from the Inquisitors Handbook background, So I have an interesting result if he goes ahead with this plan. I'm just curious if there was others who'd had a similar idea of messing with teh Sanctioning results.

Mark.

ive never dealt with that but i suppose it is possible if you get the bionics to replace it, chem geld is really just a removal of the thing that makes you susceptible to lies and deciet so replace that and you are good. though doing this i think would be an incredibly heretical act because you are tampering with something the black ships did to you, so i would be careful.

I don't think you would in face need a bionic. My reading of the talent is that you have been gelded by chems, as the name would suggest, rather than having anything surgically removed. Therefore, I think your solution would also be some kind of chemical treatments, if it's possible at all.

As far as the significance of removing your sanctioning effects, yes, it would be extremely Heretical. However, if you found the right person to do it, I think it would be a pretty concealable Heresy, since there's nothing to mark sanctioning side effects as such, and no hard and fast rules about having one. As long as you retain your brand, anything else is relatively unimportant.

The first thing that comes to mind is the regenerate power since it can regrow limbs.

Most of the thing in the table aren't hard to reverse with 40k tech, psy or a dark pact. Chemgeld is going to depend on how the chemgeld worked. The description and name implied nothing was cut it was just a chemical treatment. That said there was a reason for the chem-geld most likely that the character was subject to tempations of the flesh and it was believed he couldn't resist the lure of Slaanesh. So reversing it would be frowned upon...

PS- If this was my player I'd immediately start preping a daemon of Slaanesh. Most likely I'd have the daemon offer to reverse the chemgeld for free. Just little corruption. Then attempt to continue corrupting the player. (Ideally the restoration lessens the PC's resistance to suduction, and addiiction.) If the player takes the gift and refuses to go further. Then at some point the daemon will see that the player's reversal of the chem-geld reaches the right ears in an attempt to make the player make further deals to survive. (Or see the PC kill

Yeah, I had planned on making the chemgeld a result of his Dark Soul talent he'd gained through the "A Shadow Over Thy Soul" from the Inquisitors Handbook. I was thinking that he was comparably untainted by the experience, but that there was some hidden change to him that would come out in any children he would have. During his Sanctioning, Diviners revealed great misfortune resulting from any children he should sire therefore they insured that would not happen, while still leaving an otherwise acceptable candidate available for the Emperors work. He doesn't know why it was done to him so he won't suspect there should be any problems with reversing it. And I know the player will be up for having it reversed. The time frame of Dark Heresy means that a few years can easily pass which means this should easily come back to bite him on the ass. Possibly alot depending on how ... active he is. :)

Does the player of the character in question enjoy the story potential of being chemically castrated and trying to get rid of the effect, or does he try to get rid of the effect because it spoils his fun of playing the character in question?

In the latter case, perhaps it would be best to allow the player a re-roll on the Sanctioning table. I know the idea is for psykers to come out scarred out of the process, but if the player doesn't find the particular scarring a fun thing to play, there's little point in forcing him to.

In the former case, the name of the talent implies the effect is chem-based, and thus it could possible be counteracted by another chem treatment, Probably not an easy one to get, though. Perhaps it requires a level of expertise in either Chem Use or Medicae the character can't easily access. Perhaps concocting the counter-treatment requires specific equipment that's hard to get, like a Dark Age auto-lab under control of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Make up whatever you feel makes an interesting, compelling adventure. Remember about the consequences - the particular entry in the Sanctioning table is named "Throne-Wed", which implies the castration is considered a deliberate gift rather than a random side effect. Surely it's not prudent to shun the direct gift of the God-Emperor.

Then, of course, there are other ways to get rid of it. For a Daemon, it should be a trivial thing to undo. The price won't be as trivial, obviously...