i hav a player that is interested in playin a psyker, but he wants 2 b quite good in melee combat... the characters have their homeworld base stats + 145pts, and 1500XP 2 spend (500 fr 1st, 500 fr 2nd, +500 pts)

n e help wud b appreciated

still ... trying ... to ... interpret ... your ... modern ... texting ... jargon ...

But if I understand your question correctly, then ... my first recommendation would be ... Templar Calix (sp?), from Inquisitor's Handbook.

The one that played with me in my last game was a melee GOD!!! He eclipsed my Sororitas, and even the Moritat Assassin with twin Lathe Blades!

That is rank 4 I believe, but still the path to aspire to for the melee psyker. Gives you the goal/path to take.

H16HP01N7 said:

I am offended by the title of this thread.

But yes, as others have said, Templar is the way to go. It gives you many strong melee skills and makes upgrading WS affordable for psykers. I guess you could go towards melee with the normal ranks, but you wouldn't be very good at it.

Yeah, sorry about the shorthand, i was at my sister's house, and her keyboard was playing up. I'l have a look at those Alternate Ranks, and suggest them to my Player. Sorry for the confusion, and cheers for the advice... this game is taking me loads more work then I initially expected lol

Well one thing I should point out, it is not about "Character builds" its about character theme and mood.

Theme and mood versus character builds is in the eye of the beholder/player. Though I tend to agree, the game is much more fun with a cool character personality than one who is uber, provided the GM isn't letting the cool guy be overshadowed by his twink friends

Yeah, it was more of a case of needing advice on what advice to give. This is my 1st WH40K RPG game, and im still not 100% on the effects of some stuff in 'Game Terms'

Speaking as the now Primaris Psyker, & Mistress Templar Calix, I can tell you that Battle Psykers can truly be a goddess in combat.

Recently I was in a group...at rank 7 then...and targeted 2nd in an ambush only after the Magos Tech Priest, and before every other character in the group which included the rank 9 Assassin and rank 9 Inquisitor.

A few adventures before that I mowed down 4 out of 5 Daemons in 5 rounds. Watching them explode against my Force blade and them taking on average of 40 points of damage per hit was quite invigorating.

One thing for your Psyker to look for is helpful ways to enhance their combat, elite advances for example, outside their tree. Mine has Double Team which I picked up the moment we got an Arbitrator in the group... which also helped him a lot.

I think just about anyone can make a helluva melee psyker with base stats +145 points to spend, and I have no problem answering in more detail the potential paths you might take...

That said, I have to agree that a PURE melee built psyker isn't going to have much else going for it, and depending on group layout, that may make the psyker nothing but portable blender where he might otherwise have filled a valuable niche in the party (like Forbidden Lore master or Face)

Preferences can be up to you, but I'd say its hard to go wrong with Biomancy if you plan on getting into melee (plenty of wounds are going to need healing, and the Healer minor power ain't gunna cut it), Pyromancy if you need a little long-range fiery death or close range annihilation-even-for-warp-beings, and Telekinetics if you want a good balance of defense (Catch Projectiles... Autogun? What Autogun?), combat prowess (Nothing like Psychic Blade or Precision Telekinesis handled Force Blades to make an opponent weep), crowd control (Push) and decent long-range ack-ack (Fling, Force Bolt, and Force Barrage all come to mind).

Statwise, I'd suggest something akin to the following, given the very, very high points you're letting them play with.

+20 WS, +20 Str, +20 T, +20 Ag, +20 WP, +15 Per, +10 BS, +10 Int, +10 Fel

I'm of a Voidborn inclination for Psykers, but honestly with this build just about anything will do (though i heavily suggest against a base WP of less than 20). If the player didn't mind a little heresy in his background, the Darkholder subtype of Voidborn are very, very useful for this build. Living Nightmare might be as well, though it might make it costly to join the Templar Calix later on, as you need 10 insanity or less.

In terms of advancement, I'd suggest putting all XP into WP increases until you reach the highest modifier possible pre-ascension, purchasing Psy Rating 2 only after that is finished. Combat Talents tend to explain themselves, and if combat is the only focus, most choices will be very easy.

Once Templar Calix hits, get Lighting Attack ASAP, then you're on the oh-my-god-the-horror gravy train.

Remember to choose the battle fleet calixis void born race in Inquisitors Handbook

If you are new to the game system, I would not recommend starting with such high beginning stats and XP. There is no way you will remember what all the Talents do.

Bassemandrh said:

Compare and Contrast: Battle Fleet Calixis alternate or Dark Holder alternate.

They're both potent bonuses... but personally? I really dislike working around conditional bonuses. Inquisitors aren't just sent into Hives, Cities, Spaceships, and Space Hulks... a lot of activity, at least for my group, has been on Feral, Feudal, and Death worlds as well. BFC helps you in enclosed spaces and hinders you in large open ones... DH mostly just hinders you if you're interacting with void-born. DH also focuses more on making your psyker kick ass at being a psyker (Hard to hurt, massive WP for opposed tests and power rolls), one of the few thing a Templar Calix doesn't go gangbusters with. +5 Str, for the most part, ends up unnecessary - boost Str to get to the nearest high modifier (or if close to one already, stick with it), as it seems too expensive to increase beyond 1 advance (and there are such better things to buy!), and is relied on for damage only at lower (pre-forceblade) levels. WS is certainly useful, but being conditioned on "can't run away easily from this one" makes me worry that a 5% difference isn't going to make enough of a mark to justify seeking it.

If you're going for an Inquisitor, however, BFC might be just up your alley - +10 Command and even a Conditional Fel increase could go a long way to making an imposing (rather than, well, apparently semi-feral) figure, indeed.

I have yet to meet a level 7 Psyker who is NOT wickedly nasty in combat. Give them a focesword and they are death incarnate.

A Psyker reacts always first, can make sure that he nearly always hits, and does more damage then a battlecannon at point blank range.
Plus a Psyker is it's own group best way to get extra Insanity and Corruption. What's not to love about them?

There is no need to try to make them even nastier then usual.

Now if you want a challenge, how to make an Adept the god of melee combat?

Sister Callidia said:

Im sure there are plenty of sorcerery powers to help with that.

Anyhoo, yea the "Templar Calix" is the only way to go for melee. Bear in mind though, you want to make a good melee "psyker" and to that end you'll want him/her to have a good start as a psyker. So I would follow Unusualsuspect's suggestion and go with "Dark Holder" race (in Radicals Handbook, I've found it's bonuses more useful & penalties less hindering for a melee oriented type). Also, I would take the "Living Nightmare" background package (in Inquisitior's Handbook) for the extra bonus to Will and neat little added benefits.

Maybe there's something I've missed....but why does a Psyker always react first?

You're right that does need some qualification, but this is how I do it (and 99% of the time I do go first). Firstly you need to be a diviner and take the Preternatural awareness power. When combat is probable turn it on and go for the overbleed. Now you are rolling your initiative off of twice WP instead of Agility. D10 + 12 really helps with a high initiative.

It's laughably easy to make a melee psyker, so I'm sure following the advice in this thread and your own instincts you will soon have a lovely little Jedi of your own running around in no time.

Just wanted to weigh in on the fact that, at least according to Mack when I asked him, Precision Telekinesis cannot be used to wield a weapon.

XXXLGE said:

Diviners make decent meleers and certainly helps with initiative, but that's hardy a large percentage of the psyker population (who, to avoid giving the aforementioned insanity and corruption to fellow party members, will probably try to master their chosen discipline ASAP, which means you're waiting until Psy Rating 5 to pick up Divination as a second discipline).

Also, for the record? The bonus to initiative you get from Preternatural Awareness is in addition to the bonus you already have from agility. Lightning Reflexes is also available to Templar Calix, I believe, which means at minimum you'd be receiving 1d10 + (2 x Agility Bonus) + Willpower Bonus, adding the WP for each Overbleed. Using my suggested stats, I believe that would end up being 1d10 +15, with +7 for every overbleed (which for such a psyker should be relatively easy). At 1d10 +22, I believe that means such a psyker would be reacting faster, on average, than Eldar and Lictors. With 2 OB (29 is tough, but not impossible) that would end up being 1d10 +29, the fastest reactions I know of in-game.

Generally speaking, as a melee psyker, you can be nigh-untouchable in several aspects of combat, but not all of them at the same time (barring Ascension-level psykers, who tear such thoughts out of minds and fling them into the warp on whim). Biomancy grants extreme durability (Seal Wounds, Regenerate, Iron Flesh) and situational combat modifiers (Shape Flesh). Divinity gives excellent defense (Precognitive Dodge), offense (Precognitive Strike), and situational awareness (Preternatural Awareness). Telekinesis grants exceptional offense (Psychic Blade, Precision Telekinesis) and excellent situation defenses (Catch Projectiles, Telekinetic Shield). Pyromancy makes melee mostly redundant so long as your allies aren't nearby, and Telepathy makes taking prisoners as easy as one, two, SCREEEEEEECH, but neither really add much to the melee part of a melee psyker build.

Quartermus said:

XXXLGE said:

Our party Psyker is very fond of that power leaving my poor Assassin with all the talents and superb Agility behind in the Dusk. You name it and the Psyker got a trick for it.

Sister Callidia said:

But he can't use 'em, and certainly neither all at once or, well, often at all...

My own psyker, for example, has telekinesis. He could pick up Preternatural Awareness with his next Psy Rating, but that is unlikely given I have to decide between it, Seal Wounds, and Flame Storm. Suddenly, being able to do anything becomes choosing categories of anythings you want to do at the expense of a multitude of other anythings.

But still, even doing 'mere' categories of anythings is nothing to sneeze at, no doubt about that. That's not the only issue, though...

My DM let me purchase a much more restricted version of "fettered" manifesting even though we aren't ascension. For the curious, I add 1/2 my psy rating, rounded down, to my current power roll (WB, Discipline Focus, Power well, etc) instead of rolling any dice, with double the manifesting time. Enough for a simple technique in a mastered discipline and most minor powers, but there's either time (Invocation) or risk (dice rolling) involved in manifesting the more dangerous powers.

Even with that system, I've had multiple rolls on the phenomena table and a single scary roll on the perils table... all but one from manifesting those "screw balance, psuper psyker to the rescue!" powers. Bending the universe to your will... that is, making you, some untrained egotistical whelp, into something more potent than that guy who trained decades to do the same thing? Yeah, that can be very, very costly, and for a grand majority of psykers (psykers without Favored by the Warp immediately available), there's a very decent chance that manifesting willy-nilly is a good way to lose one's soul.

That doesn't mean psykers are not potentially unbalanced, just that we have to either be referring to Psykers as a whole, who will generally not have more than 1 discipline, or even most of the useful talents/skills, mostly until the last few ranks, and a subset of that broad group we could call Badass Psykers sporting maxed stats, the best powers from every discipline, and force weapons coming out their ears. I happen to believe that its that infamous subset, and not the whole category, guilty.

It's not that all psyker characters are egregious examples of being unbalanced.

It's just that the Imperial Psyker class is the one one in DH that is capable of being so much more powerful than the other careers, so yeah, it gets a lot of hate. The problem is inherently one of the player: a good player will not make a character which steals the spotlight even if given the choice to. But psykers get some of that hate because the game design allows them to be tweaked in that manner.

At Last Forgot said:

Missed this little gem. I, too, have gotten a Dev reply on the issue.

When I worded my question to the Devs regarding this issue, I made mention of several factors I felt influenced the answer, including the fact it is has a threshold of 23, which implies extreme difficulty and, frankly, should be balanced against Holocaust or Regeneration or similar best-of-their-discipline powers. Also, Rogue Trader's conversion of the Telekinesis Discipline explicitly allows wielding weapons using Precision Telekinesis, and is a more recent reflection of the Dev's design practices and inclinations. Also, the wording is unclear in its limits, if any, beyond describing it as the scalpel to regular telekinesis' hammer AND describing it as capable of "manipulating items as if... handling them".

Guess which answer they provided that time?

All respect to the Devs for bothering to answer questions at all, and so regularly, but contradictory answers (based on the context the question is provided in and the dev answering) is not... uncommon.

To hit on your other point, yes, I definitely agree. Psykers are not the only class incapable of being monstrously good at something, but they are capable of a lot of different and esoteric masteries, especially ones involving combat, and that is going to provoke a fair amount of jealousy from other players and annoyance from GMs.

No kidding. They said you could? Huh. I asked a whole series of questions about wielding weapons with PTK and I got a fairly straight "no, you can't, it's meant for fine manipulation". Basically, anything you can do with your hands and fingers by themselves, not your arms.

Which depressed me slightly because I too thought it should be a kind of "feather in the cap" type power, and there wasn't any other way to wield weapons with your mind, saving Kine Blades. Unfortunately, PTK isn't particularly well balanced for the job... but maybe with some tweaks and specifications. It'd be kinda broken to test WP to hit, deal WP bonus extra damage, etc.