Hi everyone - hope you're all having an awesome day and looking forward to the weekend? Hope you get some gaming in as well!

I'm a newbie GM with a lot of newbie players, 5 of us played the free downloadable adventure, liked it and then just finished Illumination over 4 more sessions.

I have a small problem with my psyker (actually several but let's start with one). Currently he has about 1200 XP, making him character level 3, making him an Aspirant.

He has also bought Psy Rating 2.

Question:

How many psychic powers should he have? The rules are very, very confusing and to even get a slight idea you need to refer to three different spots in the book. I still don't know for sure. When he takes Psy Rating 2, does he get any actual powers? (or 1 for that matter) or does he need to buy the powers on top?

Psy Rating 2 for example specifically says "Select a number of minor psychic powers up to your Willpower bonus (in his case 3).

Every time you get a new psy rating - do you get to add say 3, to what you already have? Do you have toget rid of ones you have?

Frankly I am very confused and as he's a pushy player (keeps answering rule questions other players ask me!!) I need to be 100% correct and concrete when I come down on him!

Thanks for your help everyone - cheers

Psychic powers are granted through Talents, either the Psy Rating advance itself or individually a certain number of times per rank.

Each Psy Rating entry in the Talents section should detail exactly how many powers the psyker gets to pick on upping their Psy rating. These are stackable, so gaining Psy Rating 2 does not erase the powers gained at Psy Rating 1.

Addendum (having got home to my books):

I've got Psy Rating 1 and 2 listed as giving one-half Willpower Bonus (round up) minor powers so at WB 3 they would have 4 minor power from Psy Rating 1 and 2.

From the Rank tables they can take the Talent Minor Psychic Power once from Rank 1, three times from Rank 2 and four times from Rank 3. With 1200 XP that means they can at most only have taken it twice from their current rank. Therefore, the maximum minor psychic powers the psyker can have at 1200 XP with WB 3 is 2 + 2 + 1 + 3 + 2 = 10. In total at Rank 3 they can have 12 minor psychic powers.

Looking at the book right now, I see Psy 1 giving half (round up) WB, and Psy 2 giving equal to WB. For a character with 35 Willpower, Psy 1 would give 2 Minor Psychic Powers and Psy 2 would give 3 Minor Psychic Powers.

Unusualsuspect said:

The errata (and later print runs of the core) changes Psy Rating 2 to be only half WB (rounded up) additional minor psychic powers.

Tetsugaku-San said:

We were so confused we realised that our Psyker had spent a few hundred XP on powers by Rank 5 which he never actually had the need to spend. So I worked it out with him and here's what the progression should look like up to psy rating 4 (and note that all of these are cumulative):

Psy Rating 1: 1/2 (round up) your Willpower Bonus (WB) Minor Powers (These are the powers a psyker starts with, as per p. 26 of DH core book)
Psy Rating 2: 1/2 (round up) your Willpower Bonus (WB) Minor Powers
Psy Rating 3: Select a Discipline. Then gain one power of your choice from that discipline. You also gain 1/2 WB Minor Powers
Psy Rating 4: Either, a) Gain 1/2 WB Discipline powers from discipline you know and same number of minor powers,OR b) one new discipline and gain one power from that discipline. (In the rules as written, the second option does not specify gaining any minor powers but as we could see no reason for this, we simply ruled that the Psyker would also gain 1/2 WB minor powers with option b.)

(Psy rating 5 and 6 give you choices kind of on the model of psy rating 4)

So, even without spending XP on anything other than the cost of increasing psy rating, a psyker can gain a fair number of powers. Having said that, can you really have too many powers?

Hope this helps!

Thanks everybody - really appreciate the input and feedback.

yes my edition is so early it's BL, as is the GM screen so I think I need to go through the errata again!

This should be enough to shut him up

Thanks again for your time

At psy rating 4, you do indeed get more minor powers regardless of which choice you take. I asked customer service about it, and got this reply:

Hi ...,

... it is intended that you gain Minor
powers equal to 1/2 your Willpower Bonus (round up) every time your
Psy Rating increases regardless of whether or not you open a new
discipline. Hopefully this helps!

...
Associate RPG Producer
...

Salindurthas said:

Good to know we were right!

Salindurthas said:

Well... ShaZAMM!!

Good to know.

-=Brother Praetus=-