Cifer said:

NEWS FLASH: Min-maxing CAN result in broken characters, study shows!

In term of balance

First of all and the most important thing for a GM... It's not overpowering or unbalanced ! When you compare a best craftsmanship mono FORCE weapon with a lathe-FORCE blade, the upgrade ''lathe'' only increases the weapon's damage and it's penetration by +1, BUT the cost is far from being the same !

The point being that the force sword is already overpowered. It doesn't need any more help.

Exemple :

Cost of a normal force sword (with explication) : 3 500 thrones => good mono sword = 15*3+40 = 85 + 3500 for the upgrade ''force'' = 3500 (3585 rounded to the nearest thousand but because after the 3 it's a 5, it's rouded to 3500)

''Best craftsmanship mono'' force-sword with no psy rating (1d10+1 Pen : 2) => Cost : 15*10+40 = 190 + 3500 = 4000 (3690 rounded to the nearest thousand is 4000)

Lathe-force-sword with no psy rating (1d10+2 Pen : 3) => Cost : 15+2500 = 2515 + 3500 = 6000 (6015 rounded = 6000)

That turns out not to be the case. See, the force sword in the rulebook is it's own weapon and not an actual upgrade so that cost get's multiplied by 10. It's not good quality mono, it counts as good quality mono.

So it's 3500*10=35000 and you CAN'T mono weapons without the primitive quality as per the errata VS. 35000+2500. An increase of less than 10% of the initial price for three extra penetration and one extra damage. That's your idea of balanced? No other weapon gives that much damage and penetration increase for such a small cost.

You can't just go around disassembling weapons into different upgrades, thats not how it works. And you can't just appy upgrades after the multiplication of price for quality, that's also not how it works. And you especially cant do both. That way lies best quality swords with the chain upgrade for 135 thrones extra, clearly not how the system was intended to work. The price of upgrades needs to be added before the quality modifier is applied. Otherwise you'll end up with weird stuff like that.

If your player want to spend more Thrône (2 000 Thrônes for me) for only +1 in damage and penetration... He can !

That seems to be the topic of disagreement here.

In term of Game Play

Description of a ''force weapon'' : Made from the rarest materiels and interlaced with psychic reactive and channelling circuitry of a design said to have originated with the Emperor himself''

''Made of the rarest materiels'' = lathe is certainly a ''rarest materiels''

Yes, beluga caviar is also a "rarest of materials" and yet I'd laugh at anyone who tried to forge a lathe blade of it. Apples and sports cars.

Can it be interlaced with psychic reactive and channelling circuitry ? Answer : Why not ?

Because it's overpowered.

In term of Rules

Mono = it's a upgrade and mono weapons no longer count as ''primitive''

Lathe = It's a upgrade and lathe-blade no longer count as ''primitive''

No much difference especially in the case of force weapon

I agree and since you can't mono the force sword that seems to settle the question for you and me.

linearblade said:

Your Force Weapon penetration values appear to be incorrect. Penetration of 2, plus the wielder's Psy Rating of 5 would net a 7, not 12. You do NOT add the psykers willpower bonus to the weapons Penetration, which is the only way I can see in your example of pulling a penetration of 12. Otherwise, the rest of the math seems pretty good.

-=Brother Praetus=-

linearblade said:

Okay, well, barring what cifer and the others have pointed out about trying to combine two different orrigins, if a psyker did start the game with a WP of 40, their maximum WP pre-ascension would be 60. The only way, barring possible background packages or elite advance packages, pre-assension is to start with a WP of 50... and that is most definitly not a tirvial stat to start with by any stretch of the imagination ;-)

Graver said:

one is an origin, one is an xp cost starting package., so very doable to 60 because any ability at 30-40 IS trivial, since I doubt anyone is making 20-30 psykers.

I did the math in the past...

how to get a max WP psyker...

roll 20 (or buy) for WP

start of as mindcleansed for +5 (or whatever homeworld or origin gives you +5WP voidborn for example)

starting package living nightmare for +5

or roll divination "In the darkness, follow the light of Terra." for +3

or roll sanctioning side-effects: Hypno Doctrination for +3

buy 20WP for 1,6k xp (can be done by rank 3)

you end up with the maximum Willpower of 20fix+20rolled+5home/origin+5startingpackage+3divination+3sanctioning+20xp ==>81 Willpower

If you miss your roll by 5 (roll a 15) and don't get the divination and don't get the sanctioning side effect you are left with a plain 70 willpower ...

70 WP is absolutely accessible without cheating/point buy/having a 1 in a million dice roll streak while creating the character

at ascencion level you can buy another 10 WP giving you a max of 9 WPB without unnatural WP and a max of 27 with unnatural WP*3

neither radicals HB nor DotdG can be used to push this any further there is no mutation and nothing I could find

linearblade said:

Yup, you are indeed playing a different game from the rest of us. And not reading posts much either...

@Sirlion: Your math is a touch off. By the numbers you put out, the maximum WP would be 76, not 81. To get the 81 you would need IH and RH as I believe you'd have to be a Darkholder (with crazy good rolling luck) but I might have missed one other option.

Suffice to say,the WP 60+ crowd of psykers is most definitely in the minority and exceptional characters because of the amount of criteria that must be met. Barring supper crazy WTF rolling luck, an Imperial world psyker would never hit the 60's nor would a hiver, nor a feral-worlder. You can min-max to just about anything, but just because you can doesn't make such a thing trivial, it just makes it twinked.

Graver said:

**** I should've checked....

yes my build did contain darkholder I think... nevertheless 81 is the max possible build ... and 70WP is within reach

Graver said:

Now I dont know what game everyone else is playing, but I DO know I wouldnt play football if I was runt (go see the movie Rudy). The same goes for psykers. The Imperium doesnt employ weak willed psykers do they? they are sucked up by the black ships and then fed to the emperor. People tend to doing things they are good at. not average at. Thats why you take aptitude tests in school, to help find what you good at, and attempt (however poorly) to guide you to that job, so you can be a good cog in society. There can be exceptions, but again the majority get to where they should be going.

So Yes, I doubt there are many low WP psykers. In fact to go even further, I bet a greater ratio of feral psykers are snacked on, because they have less WP.

Imperial Psykers have +3 WP, so I dont know why they wouldnt make good ones... so I 'm not sure why you mention them.

And yes, I read the entire thread. The post readily changed from 'can I make a force lathe sword' to is this weapon cheese? There are adequate reasoning for and against lathe force sword. My input was not required.

I guess if you had Joe-non-optimized psyker in your group, and he really wanted a force weapon its fine. but as soon as Darth-Psyker joins your game (or another player rerolls after running out of fate points), your in a pickle. b/c you cant really tell Darth-Psyker he cant have a force sword b/c he is broken with it, but joe the average psyker can... because, well he is just average.

the ways to get 60+ wP are simple and not only that, the reasons to get 60+ WP are logical and eventual. There is just no way around it. You can claim otherwise but the simple math makes it clear: Average stat = 20 +11 = 31. I am a psyker, so I either put my high stat (preferably 35+) into WP.or I just choose to be void born. there is very little luck here. 'rolling' a 31-35 for your psyker WP isnt lucky. its likely. If you are 35+WP (or get a good tarot, or sanctioning effect) you dont need to be void born.

So unless you are FULLY RANDOMING your character from the ground up, you will get 60+ WP psykers.

So unless you are FULLY RANDOMING your character from the ground up, you will get 60+ WP psykers.

Which is kind of funny, considering DH assumes just that with regards to your abilities. Your chance of achieving a 15+ on a specific attribute when prepared to blow your reroll on it are 37%.

Or are you talking about houserules? In that case, why not just disallow the combination of the Voidborn/Mindblank and Living Nightmare and extreme focus on a single ability early on? And the latter isn't even a houserule considering a GM has to ok every advance made anyway.

However, even if we allowed the force sword, the origin/background mumbo-jumbo and half the XP spent on a single attribute - we're still dealing with an absolute one-trick pony here. Everything he can't solve with his psy abilities or by hacking it to bits, he can't handle at all, while the guy with the power fist hasn't exactly sunk too many XP into that thing. And since he's on the Savant Militant path, it'll be a while before he gets to Favoured by the Warp, so he'll have a chance of Phenomena turning ugly with every power manifested and with every single enhanced sword strike.

Look this whole argument about how much you have to minmax to get 70WP is moot. Sooner or later you're going to get a rather nice WP for a psyker no matter how much role play and how little roll play goes into it. "Oh noes a daemon ate my leg because I'm to weak willed" is not something a character with parts of his motivation set to "not having leg eaten by daemon" responds to by weight lifting.

And true, if you take it slow you might not get the force sword and high WP until a rank when the guardsman get's his assault cannon. But who would bring an assault cannon to a party? Who would bring it shopping?

There's no eqivalent RP limitation on the force sword, it's a fancy sword that kicks like a heavy weapon added to a character class that already has a head that kicks like a heavy weapon. Uncalled for, full of cheese and not fun.

I'm bringing this up the next session, my proposed fix is to let the force sword do one additional d10 if the WP test is won by psyker and then nothing more. It'll still be the equivalent of a great powersword in terms of damage if wielded by a decent psyker. But not the equivalent of a lascannon.

And true, if you take it slow you might not get the force sword and high WP until a rank when the guardsman get's his assault cannon. But who would bring an assault cannon to a party? Who would bring it shopping?

Who would bring the sword to a battlefield and jog 500 metres over non-heavily-covered ground to enemies who have the assault gun?

It's about the right tools for the right job - and a psyker has the right tools for non-overt situations, if the enemy doesn't recognize him as a psyker, which is probably a "wait a minute..." situation as large as bringing a heavy weapon for many social situations.

Who would bring the sword to a battlefield and jog 500 metres over non-heavily-covered ground to enemies who have the assault gun?

I would. Not the jogging part, but I'd keep the sword for any potential joggers from the other side intent on disrupting my shooting and throwing of lightning.

It's about the right tools for the right job - and a psyker has the right tools for non-overt situations, if the enemy doesn't recognize him as a psyker, which is probably a "wait a minute..." situation as large as bringing a heavy weapon for many social situations.

Unless he introduces himself by "Hi, I'm dave, I'm a psyker, I'd like some lho sticks" I'm not seeing the limitation on bringing his las cannon sword anywhere.

I'm not saying psykers shouldn't get awesome powers or that the force sword should be just another sword. Just that the force sword doesn't have to outdamage lascannons.

I would. Not the jogging part, but I'd keep the sword for any potential joggers from the other side intent on disrupting my shooting and throwing of lightning.

Whom are you throwing what kind of lightning at? I haven't found a power with a standard range of more than 100 metres, not even in Ascension.

Unless he introduces himself by "Hi, I'm dave, I'm a psyker, I'd like some lho sticks" I'm not seeing the limitation on bringing his las cannon sword anywhere.

How about that friendly sanctioning brand you're stuck with? Or, assuming your GM lets you somehow cover that up, the other party's psyker? When you've got a psyker with you, every cover for your cell that might remotely work against others with a psyker needs to explain that psyker away somehow. The only other career with that kind of obviousness is the techpriest (who can at least sometimes be disguised as a servitor, though this may have people around him wishing for the brain-bleach).

Whom are you throwing what kind of lightning at? I haven't found a power with a standard range of more than 100 metres, not even in Ascension.

Allright, so soul killer with that astral body thing. Point is, I'd still bring the sword.

How about that friendly sanctioning brand you're stuck with? Or, assuming your GM lets you somehow cover that up ,

Exactly, I'll wear a hat . What's the GM going to say, no they don't make them in your size?

the other party's psyker? When you've got a psyker with you, every cover for your cell that might remotely work against others with a psyker needs to explain that psyker away somehow. The only other career with that kind of obviousness is the techpriest (who can at least sometimes be disguised as a servitor, though this may have people around him wishing for the brain-bleach).

I'll hope he doesn't do a psyniscience check or get the degrees of success to pinpoint the disturbance of the warp. How is that different from passing your decieve test for "no not at all, i'm not a cop" or similar? Things get you found out, that stuff happens with or without psykers. And this is not about the force sword, it's an inherent quality of the psyker class itself.

And also, having a psyker go by on the street might make you more suspicious, but not as suspicious as having a guy in power armour walk by with an assault cannon. Psyker exist in 40k, even non inquisition psykers and having one go about his business doesn't always mean he's out to get you. Bringing your assault cannon is a clear indication that you mean business in a way that the psyker is not., he can't well leave his brain in storage for when it's time to use it.

Cifer said:

Dark heresy isnt about going to the battle field. Its about investigation , small battles etc.

as you state, its about having the right tools for the job. and the right tool for ALL melee jobs is a force sword with attached psyker.

There is no need to bring drugged up penal legionair with powerfist, or ogryn or anything else. Because a force sword in its sheath is commonplace. it looks like a sword, one that many people around you have.

If you want to walk around with a backpack power supply, AND DO LESS DAMAGE IN MELEE, then walk around with a power fist... AND you can look like a misfit from Judge Dread or something.

If you think you can go shopping, or 'investigate' or 'go incognito' with an auto cannon... you tell me

Yes, the ONLY thing that out damages the force Sword is this. and in Real life it cannot even be carried by a person. (scroll down to the holly wood section for some movie trivia facts)

world.guns.ru/machine/minigun-e.htm

on a side note, it should be noted a WP 7 psyker brings his own heavy weapons to the table in the form of Force barrage and firestorm. In any situation that would actually require him to be worried,

He just pops Telekinetic Shield, and IGNORES your autocannon, then he walks across the battle field while your bullets bounce off his shields and trout-slaps you with his force sword, sending you to -20 hp, Lulzing all the way.

If he really wants to range attack you, bc killing you with physical effort is too much, he can hit you for 7d10+49 and say "astala vista, baby"

Yes, the force sword is beyond broken Toy for a beyond broken class.

Graspar said:

I agree here. On top of all that is said here, its not like every single opponent you face has a psyker.... Indeed they are probably exceedingly rare.(else the imperium does a poor job of picking them up in the black ships)... and of those psykers, they arent constantly using psynicience to scout for psykers (is it a passive ability? this would make my constant scouting argument wrong)

In every warhammer book I've read , the psykers dont walk around with "I'm a psyker" on their face. Kinsky from ravenor didnt look it, and he was better than ravenor. Eisenhorn doesnt look like a psyker, PAtience Kiss doesnt. The list goes on.

I'm sure there is a brand somewhere, but its not a flashing neon light.

Cifer said:

37% chance for having a bad ass psyker? sounds like someone in the group will make it, or you will have one by the 3rd character you paper (provided you are motivated enough, to con your GM into thinking you died legitimately instead of suicide).

The aforementioned psyker isnt a rare occurance. so thus its a problem.

However more to the point of ' this psyker is a 1 trick pony' ... have you looked at the guardsman class? thats one trick pony. There is no such thing as a 1 trick pony psyker.. His abilities allow him to do a whole range of things automagically that other classes have to roll dice for.

Melee combat... Force sword, har har I win

range combat ... force barrage/firestorm... har ar I win again... or I TELEPORT to you, and again. har har I win with melee

social situations... Dominate (yes I know, physical only), suggestion, knack, <power that gives me super bonus here> yep, I still win

stealth ... see me not, wall walker, float, sense presense...yay I win againz

Tech use or whatever... k let me bring my tag along adept / tech priest.

But keep in mind, this psyker is your bruiser. he is only there for your combat situations... if you had a choice of which units you bring to you side as an inquisitor, in combat situation, and rarity was not an issue.

Would you either

a) bring mixed, non psyker units (guardsment , assassins, scum etc)

b) bring only combat psykers with force swords and combat powers

Psykers will win every time.

they arent constantly using psynicience to scout for psykers (is it a passive ability? this would make my constant scouting argument wrong)

It's a full action and simple success only tells you there's some kind of disturbance somewhere in the warp. For one degree of success you get a general area and for two degrees you get an exact location. Also, it's range is (Perception bonus+d10)*degrees of sucess metres. So it's not like you're instantly and automatically spotted walking by on the street, that's only for autocannons.

But of course, psykers ARE supposed to be badass, that's what they get for the "eaten by daemon" and "social pariah" drawbacks. I'm just not extatic about adding a melee weapon that one shots unbound daemonhosts on top of their already impressive repertoire. Enough is enough, the sword can play nice with the other melee weapons at 1d10+1+psy rating pen 2+psy rating with a chance of one additional d10. It'll still beat two handed chain powerswords and be able to contend somewhat with the powerfist.

Graspar said:

I agree.

if you are not playing with fettered casting rules... Psykers are sorta ok... although since everything in the game is based on WP bonus, there is no reason to have a psy rating greater than 3, other than a force sword.

If you are playing with fettered casting, Psykers have ZERO drawbacks. The problem is that fettered casting is a good thing. the spells being designed around WP bonus instead of Psi rating however make this rule horribly flawed and useless.

That fettered thing gives me ideas for another fix. Normal sucess on the manifest gives you maximum one d10 damage and every 5 points of overbleed ups the capability by 1d10, so potential damage goes up with potential perils and great psykers do better than worse ones. You can reliably go autocannon on the damonhost, but not without risk.

linearblade said:

Sure there is... If you're not using the Fettered/Unfettered/Push rules, then the talent Psychic Supremacy becomes useful again for those who manage to sweet talk their GM into letting them take it as an elite advance. Being able to disregard a single rolled 9 on every power check using less than half your dice is always a nice thing. Also, Psy Rating 4+ is where you get a good chunk of your additional Discipline powers from, and Discipline Mastery is nothing to scoff at.

But, maybe that's just my way of thinking.

Graspar said:

BLINK BLINK

Um, that "fix" seems more in line with a break the size of the San Andreas fault line.

I definitely prefer that there is no Overbleed on the channeling of " Killing Intent " with a Force Weapon. The successful manifestation of the power allows for an opposed willpower test between psyker and target. For each degree of success you get the +1d10; a basic success doesn't cut it, and it keeps it so it's still not a entirely a sure thing even for PMEP ( Power Munchkin Example Psyker [tm]) with a WP of 70+ and Unnatural Willpower (X) .

-=Brother Praetus=-

BLINK BLINK

Um, that "fix" seems more in line with a break the size of the San Andreas fault line.

I definitely prefer that there is no Overbleed on the channeling of "Killing Intent" with a Force Weapon. The successful manifestation of the power allows for an opposed willpower test between psyker and target. For each degree of success you get the +1d10; a basic success doesn't cut it, and it keeps it so it's still not a entirely a sure thing even for PMEP ( Power Munchkin Example Psyker [tm]) with a WP of 70+ and Unnatural Willpower (X).

-=Brother Praetus=-

Obviously that's the case if you disregard the difference between "each 5 points of overbleed gives another d10 damage" and "each 5 points of overbleed gives you another potential d10 damage". Potential as in I'm not suggesting removing the opposed willpower test, just adding the amount of overbleed to limit the maximum degrees of success on that opposed test that adds damage.

It's a roof to the damage, not a new way of determining the damage. If you play it safe and hold back on your power die it's not going to be a whole lot until you're a really skilled psyker.

Graspar said:

Ah, I see. The threshold for the power is pretty low; practically guaranteeing a successful manifestation. Increasing the potential damage by every 5 points of overbleed allows for pretty quick build ups. It's not a bad idea, just requires a little bit more work and observation.

So in short, we're looking at this sort of spread for the additional damage under your idea;

• PT - 6 = max +1d10 damage
• Manifestation total 11+ nets max +2d10 damage
• Manifestation total 16+ nets max +3d10 damage, etc.
• Opposed WP still determines actual bonus damage.

Maybe setting it to every 10 overbleed on the manifestation roll would work better. Encourage the psykers to take that little extra risk for some more oomph on their damage potential, so it would look more like this;

• PT - 6 = max +1d10 damage
• Manifestation total 16+ nets max +2d10 damage
• Manifestation total 26+ nets max +3d10 damage, etc.
• Opposed WP still determines actual bonus damage.
  

Either way, it's a potentially viable setup. But come Ascension , it may get a bit more overboard.

As to my missing the subtle nuances of your idea previously; lack of sleep makes proper comprehension a b!tch.

-=Brother Praetus=-