Im new running any Fantasy Flight RPG, and I have two players wanting to be Librarians. Is this too much for a game or no?

Brother Thorn said:

I have two librarians in my group too but they haven't played together yet. Don't think it's a problem at lower ranks though. First of all, it's easy to ramp up horde difficulty, etc. Secondly, unless the Librarians cast fettered, they are living in constant danger - Perils of the Warp are a constant hazard. If don't cast fettered, sooner or later it will hit on you.

Remember that you can't use fate points to re-roll a Psychic Phenomena roll or a Peril of the Warps roll. The rolls on those tables are not tests. Let them cast at Pushed Power Level. Sooner or later, they'll have to burn fate points.

And please note that channeling energy into a force weapon works the same as using a psy power (has been clarified by the author in the meantime).

Alex

I personally limited the group to one librarian (and one devestator). It's not that they're too powerful IMHO, but they can be a an extra tax on your adventure planning (you have to plan your encounters around having wonder twin powers most likely, and you'll probably have to worry about them using clairvoyance powers as well) and it means more work for you.

Again, not that it can't be done or would be unbalancing, you just have to be prepared for it. And I'm lazy

there are some really great powers that make GM'ing the group tough. I think you have to create a Librarian around supporting the group to do that.

Like Force Dome: AV 12-14 @ level to allies within 30m> Basically it will allow the Battle Brothers to sit back and shoot till they run out of ammo or enemies. (AV12+ PA8+ TB8= 28 Damage reduction/ hit) Keep that up and then just smite till its melee time. (30-60m range/ 3d10 pen3 or 6d10 pen6)

-Team that guy up with a Tac-marine and or a Devastator and it a tough nut to crack.

good thing is, it requires your Librarian to take more of a supportive role, not too many people who want to play a Librarian are willing to do that. Atleast not in my experience with the games.

That force dome has to be created and sustained. With starting librarians, that won't automatically work at fettered level (and there's always a chance of a power failing anyway). And if they want to use it unfettered or pushed? Psychic phenomenon are always fun. Later on, it's going to be become more of an issue but that's what more, bigger hordes and swathes of elites are for.

40k Junkie said:

At the psy rating you suggested it's only +6 AP. And +12 only when pushing with a guaranteed Perils of the Warp. Librarians who don't cast fettered tend to live on borrowed time.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Yeah, perhaps my group does keep things fast and loose. We always bank a fate point for the reroll.

40k Junkie said:

As for as I know, the roll on the tables for Psychic Phenomena and Perils of the Warp are not "tests", and thus does not allow a reroll due to fate point... Your librarian might be in for a rough awakening.

Nightsorrow said:

But fate points will work on the roll that triggers the phenomena. If a phenomena triggered and the power didn't activate it would be a good time to spend one. The test passing and triggering phenomena is going to be a situational decision.

Bilateralrope said:

But then it's only +6 AP for starting libs. You can get +12 AP only by pushing good luck. I especially love the entry where the PC is thrown 1D10 meters into the air, 1D10 x (1d10+1) Impact, no armour reduction. More deadly than a Daemon Prince. And one of the main NPCs in Purge the Unclean fragged herself with the result where the psy power is thrown back on the caster. As you can see, there's no shortage of FUBAR on that table.

Alex

Two librarians are a fairly powerful thing, especially if one of them rolls for a Space Wolf, takes perform (storytelling) [which can be used like Command in some situations], gets elected the boss of the group and constantly takes Oath of Knowledge for the group. Those psychic phenomena become much less dangerous when the Libbys can reroll the results of their Phenomena; even more so if they take Rite of Sanctioning [available at first level].

The Libby of my group constantly pushes his powers, because the forementioned combo makes him laugh at the prospect of psychic phenomena causing a Perils. Heck, the SW Runepriest two-shot the Broodlord in Final Sanction by smacking it first with a pushed Smite, followed by a Killing Strike and a Push with his force sword the next round.

In short, as long as your players don't discover the combo I mentioned above, you should be fine

Rhazagal said:

Well, my groups Tactical Marine killed a charging Broodlord with two bursts (2!) from his Boltgun using Hellfire Rounds.

Plus neither RoS nor OoK helps with pushing as you roll straight on Perils table where you don't get a re-roll (only Psychic Phenomena table). Casting Unfettered just becomes fairly safe.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Um, what? Where does it say that Pushing makes you roll immediately on the Perils table?

Pg. 185, DW Rulebook, under the Push bulletpoint: "...He must make a Focus Power Test. However, regardless of this test's result, the psyker will automatically generate a disturbance in the Warp and must roll on Table 6-1: Psychic Phenomena ..."

It specifically states that Pushing forces you to roll on the Psychic Phenomena table, not Perils of Warp table. Is there some errata out there that changes this?

Advocati said:

Nowhere, it was just a lapse of concentration on my behalf, I think I am developing symptoms of a cold (no joke), sorry for the confusion.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Ah, alrighty then, thanks for clarifying. The Librarian in my group is a fairly decent character, but has been having ungodly luck with his PP rolls. I was wondering if I could somehow force him to roll on Perils instead. Rite of Sanctioning takes half the fun out of seeing his PP rolls, heh.

Rhazagal said:

Completely agree with you, like I was saying, Librarians are a power gamings dream, broken if you know the combo. Just like in DH with Biomancy and TK.

Advocati said:

I see a lot of people here on the forums reference the Phenomena and Perils tables interchangeably, which seems to be the case with Alex's post. Yes, it can cause confusion, but I do not believe it is intentional misdirection on the part of most posters. Results on the Phenomena (to the tune of the Muppets' Ma Na Na Na song) table can lead to some pretty interesting RP opportunities. I find them to be extremely entertaining.

Of course, then you get GM's like the one I have for Dark Heresy were he pretty much seems to skip right over the Phenomena table and goes straight to Perils no matter what the result of the roll for oddity or badness.

EDIT: The forum software does not recognize the ASCII characters for Eighth and Double Eighth notes... I declare FAIL.

-=Brother Praetus=-

Your Libs (if they don't take rite of sanct) will think the phenomina table a joke... until they roll weapon jinx and the grenades (or heaven forfend, meltabombs) goes off and kills party members lol (I know... I've done this... with my own librarian... poor space wolf *cough*).

Remember, every power has its place, purpose, and danger. For one, I <3 Hellfire, but there are places I can't use it (ie: enclosed spaces) because, it's an AoE (at at push for rank 4 with warp conduit, that's 20 meter radius... no one's dodging from ground zero, or even close to ground zero!) to the tune of 10d10 damage? that 40 meter diameter bubble? that's half of my combat map. At the IDEAL, everything that's in that blast is BBQed, but as soon as those mooks are among the party, I could use it... and kill the rest of the party as well, or tone it down, but even then, 6d10 damage is alot, and 3d10 damage with no pen is usually not enough. Force Bubble is nice, but at half action to sustain it, you're right, the lib takes a back seat, and it's only useful when the fight is distance based (and we already know, SM's rule against anything that's not Tau hordes at range). Somewhat overkill.

I will admit... I love the DA forcefield... pushing that at rank 4 tuning my armor up to 40 + 8 TB means something has to really really hit me to hurt me, but, that takes a full round to activate, and then Ican't move after it's up, great if I'm center man of a strongpoint... and my opponent isnt' something like a daemon prince, or if the enemy is too dumb to go around me... etc.

Know what your Librarians can do, and don't set up every meaningful encounter for them to simply be able to the bomb and walk away with a smirk.

Brother Praetus said:

That's what it took for you, refusal to recognize ASCII notes characters?

Charmander said:

I LOL'd. (No offense to Brother Praetus intended though.) (Much offense intended to the forums software, otoh.)

Alex

The Libby powers, while powerfull, have a very short range. I recently ran a game with two Librarian-equivalents in the team and they rarely even got to use their powers since Tacticals and Devastators mowed down most of the stuff before they ever got to Avnger-range. Having two Devastators or a handfull of Tacticals who actually know how to use their bolters is much more challenging for encounter-planning than Librarian or two.

+1 on the range argument.

Or are they supposed to count as weapon ranges for the purpose of short/medium/long? (I don't think so, at least, both me and my librarian player treated it as a static maximum range).

KommissarK said:

Given that smite mentions range modifiers, it sounds like it's as with ranged weapons and I play it as such. Seriously, smite should have about the same range as a pistol.

Alex

ak-73 said:

Smite specifically is subject to the range rules as per conventional ranged weapons (as noted in its own entry - at Psy Rating 3, the range, damage and area effect of Smite are all appropriate... much higher, and it gets silly), but no other psychic powers are subject to those rules - the range listed for a psychic power is, with the singular exception of Smite, an absolute range, not a range increment.

Charmander said:

Given the nature and purpose behind ASCII characters, that is an extreme FAIL. But no, it merely reminds me of and reinforces my evaluation.

ak-73 said:

No offense taken. The post was intended to be inspire some laughter, just not that particular part of it. The reference to a Muppets song coming to mind whenever someone says Phenomena , on the other hand... Click

-=Brother Praetus=-