Referring to the original post, I know it's old but I wanted to clarify a few things.

Librarian starts with a Psy Rating of 3, only upon obtaining a new Rank may the Librarian gain a stronger Psy Power rating. At Rank 8, they can finally have a Psy Rating of 10. Rank 8 is basically a Chief Librarian and hero of the chapter.

When using Psychic Powers the Librarian chooses how powerful - Fettered, Unfettered or Push - this is very important but no matter what just using a power could cause psychic phenomena (see page 187 of Deathwatch).

I have not seen many "anti-peril" talents. Even "favored by the warp" is perilous because you are still rolling on the chart. "Warp Affinity" is the same way. It doesn't prevent the psychic phenomena roll, it just gives a chance at making it less deadly. I have not really come across too much that let's you resist the effects of Psychic Phenomena. Even then, the Librarian might get a reroll but gains corruption points. FFG did a very good job limiting the Librarian. They are scary to have in your group and one that is throwing powers around spells doom for himself and his kill-team.

Power Levels

Fettered : Half Power. Strength of power is half (rounded up). They make a focus test as normal. No chance of triggering Psychic Phenomena.

Unfettered : Full power. Strength of the power uses full Psy Rating. Make a focus test to manifest like normal. If doubles are rolled on the dice the Librarian triggers psychic phenomena, regardless of whether he passed or failed his test… it is always dangerous.

Push : +3 to Psy Rating. Make focus test to manifest power. Regardless of what happens, Psychic Phenomena roll is automatic. If doubles are rolled the Librarian suffers one level of fatigue also.

Keep in mind if the Librarian is sustaining powers it gets worse. THE ODDS OF ROLLING DOUBLES ON A D10 IS PRETTY HIGH ACTUALLY. I think it is something around a 5% chance, about the same as rolling a 20 on a d20. Not exact as number crunching is my strongest point.

The Peril Involved

When rolling on the psychic phenomena table there is a 25% chance you are going right to the Perils of the Warp roll. There is basically a 50% of something very, very bad happening. Even some of the simple things on the psychic phenomena table can be killers. Insanity and corruption are constant threats. Librarians that ignore corruption, insanity and the threats will die quickly.

The Librarian Powers at a Glance

Even getting to Rank 3 takes time. A Librarian will only have a Psy Rating of 5 at Rank 3. Nearly all experience must be spent on psychic powers to really push into the realm brought up by the original question. Sticking to the rules is the most important thing to restrict a Librarian. There is no need to add or change things, just read the rules. Since it was the first game you were playing, I doubt you were even Rank 3. But it's possible to get into Rank 2 pretty quick so we will say you were dealing with a Rank 2 Librarian using Smite.

To use Smite, you make a Focus Test modified like ranged attack. Lets use it Unfettered (PR 4). Let us assume the Focus Test succeeds. He deals 4d10 energy damage with a penetration of 4. It will affect everything (even allies) within 4 meters and he has a range of 40 meters with the ability. So an 8 meter radius explosion of energy occurs at impact. The Smite will have a penetration of 4. That pen is going to break even with most standard Xenos armor. Not the Tyranid warrior or anything above a grunt… who will have around 8 or so. You will deal 4d10 minus 4 to a tyranid warrior, it will definitely not kill him and you just risked your life to do it by not rolling doubles on your focus test. Now the great thing is this… the player might start loving the damage… and fail a few rolls here or there and cause some insanity and corruption… that's what it does. I'm telling you right now… that in three different games I have seen the Librarian become a problem more than once. In one occassion a Librarian was drug off into the warp after pushing to get a massive hit… when you push you always roll on the table.

Conclusion

The rules in the book work. A Librarian will get corruption points and most likely a few insanity points along the way. The rules that govern librarians are in place and they work great - you should always use them. There are three things that really affect the Librarian - the psychic phenomena table when using powers and stronger than 1/2 Psy Rating, the insanity gained and the corruption gained. At 100 Corruption the character is lost forever and corruption never goes away. You can remove insanity points but not corruption. There are other rules outside of the Core book that you can do more with too.

It would take a very powerful Librarian to fire 10d10 smites without losing his soul to corruption after just a few game sessions. Librarians are not too strong. The best thing you can do if you want to limit them is focus on the buildup of corruption if you wanted to.

Rather than houseruling the crap out of librarians, you could just use vast hordes of doom. A psy rating 10 librarian smacking a giant horde with his blasty power of doom will hit for 1d10+10 magnitude damage. I can get a tactical marine breaking 50 magnitude damage in a single round with a storm bolter. By the same logic a tank will out range the librarian by alot, but that tank is gonna cry when the devestator's krak missles are done with it. Try hitting your players with combined arms forces. Just my two cents.

Cryhavok said:

I also try to avoid house ruling to limit a player. The smite ability at a PR 10 is actually pretty insane. Range is based on the psy rating. It would be 10d10. with a pretty massive blast radius. I believe it would be a total of 20 meters across (10 meters out from the blast point) with a range of 100 meters. But then again, every roll has a chance to pop up a psychic phenomena with doubles rolled on the Focus test. Your probably going to get plenty of chances to hit a rightous fury also with a pretty easy chance. But we're talking about a Rank 8 Librarian, that's a pretty experienced character right there.

Cryhavok said:

Right and I agree with you. I understand completely how hordes work and smite (or any psy power for that matter) would only deal 11-20 magnitude damage. For a single action from one player that's pretty good. I was just stating a few general facts. Also, the danger of using psy powers a lot against a horde, you're going to roll doubles at some point.

As far as a heavy bolter with metal storm rounds (blast 2). Storm of Iron doubles his magnitude damage. He still needs to get his degrees of success - ROF 10. Bolter Drill gives him +1. So it, possible to get all the hits necessary, well 8-9 of them anyway. So if 8 hit (a really good roll) he would be able to dish out some pretty insane damage against a horde… far more than a Librarian. I already understand that. but more commonly - he will have 2-4 degrees of success dealing 4 magnitude damage per round. He will commonly be dealing 8-16 magnitude damage. I think all in all the heavy bolter and the Librarian would still be on pretty even ground - due to the fact that the Librarian doesn't need 'degrees of success' in order to hit with the power. A Blast 2 doesn't give +2 damage per round just +1 because it is explosive damage right?

I actually prefer the strom bolter for this. With two to four degrees of success your hitting with four to eight shots. Metal storm rounds make each shot a blast 2 hit, so each of the average of six hits will hit for two damage, putting us at twelve so far. Explosive adds one more. Devestater ability unrelenting devestation adds 1d5, we can average that to 3. Storm of iron doubles that to 32 magnitude. Maximum, with 5 degrees of success would come in at 52 magnitude. The only thing a tactical marine would lose from that would be the 1d5 from the devestator ability, and with marksmen a marine could do this from outside the range of smite. The minimum with only one pair of shots from the storm bolter hiting is going to hit that horde for 12-20 damage from the devestator, or just ten from the tactical marine. Also note that, thanks to the recoil supression in astartes armor, you can dual wield storm bolters maxing out your potential magnitude damage at 104, easily laying waste to almost any horde in a single round.

And a heavy flamer will hit a horde pretty hard too, for (2d5+7)x2, assuming cleanse and purify and storm of iron, likely to at least equal and likely surpass a smite against a horde.

Cryhavok said:

I agree that using a flamer, storm bolter or heavy bolter is going to be more effective. Using a horde is one more effective way to allow other members of the kill-team to shine. It's a great point. Getting back to the point I disagree that Librarians are taking over the show - like I said earlier. The primary thing you need to do when you have a overzealous librarian that wants to use powers is make sure you are using the Psychic Phenomena table. It does limit the librarian and creates a great deal of tension.

Also, I have never even had to deal with a high rank librarian. I think the highest we have played was where we were around Rank 3-4. The librarian in our group was already a little bit insane at this point. I think the largest magnitude horde I have put my characters against was 40 but there were other things that they were fighting at the same time.

In Conclusion

I wouldn't come up with houserules specfically limiting the Librarian. I personally like to design my encounters in ways create a dynamic encounter… For Example: An orc nob, a few orc boys, half dozen gretchen and a horde of attack squigs can be a nasty encounter and give everyone the opportunity to participate.

I like the idea of using the corruption from Dark Heresy. In Deathwatch, they are pretty much immune to corruption until they hit 100 and hand over their character. There is a malignancy table in Dark Heresy that would work pretty good. I would steer clear of mutations because after all they are space marines and resistant to the taint of corruption. All in all, there should be some measure of corruption occuring to the Librarian when they reach each 10 points.

I also believe that there should be ways to remove corruption that are difficult. But yes, I believe the malignancy table in Dark Heresy should be used.

One thing you could do to limit a psyker that is getting out of hand would be to introduce the idea that the state of the warp in the local area being part of the terrain and effecting those who use the warp. IE the warp is restless, the viel is thin in the area, feels like a storm is brewing, the warp is truely calm here, etc. Then apply modifiers to psychic powers based on the state of the warp. You could have +/- focus power, +/- phenomena, auto phenomena, extra phenamena, minimum of unfettered/push, or worse. It being the sea of souls you could have unchecked emotion sirge through the area and people must play to thier demeanors when it happens. Imagination is the limit.

While I agree on this somewhat, especially if it fits the current adventure/mission - I don't think creating situations that immobilize a character. I really think FFG has done a great job at balancing the characters for a party role. Like we just talked about with the hordes, a devastator is going to be king at taking down hordes (and vehicles).

Also, a Rank 8 Librarian should be very powerful with a lot of tools but they are not that bad. Refering to the very first post in the thread, a Rank 1 or 2 Librarian could never achieve the level of power allowing for 10d10 attacks with 10 attacks a round. It's just not going to happen. The rules are not being used right. I love hearing a Librarian say I want to push…. as a GM it gets me all giddy inside. I am an adversarial GM. I don't play a character - I just run the game and while the PC's are definitely the center of the world as far as my games go - I also make the games so there is a threat of dying and taking risks while rewarding… are going to have consequences.

Like Cryhavok and a few others have said. In some cases, creating unstable warp areas are great but try and always make a positive side so that the player doesn't feel like his Librarian is getting picked on. Examples:

• Enduring Warp: This area has had long term warp activity nearby. Gain a +10 on Focus Power Tests. All psy powers trigger the Psychic Phenomena with a -25 on the check. If a power would also trigger psychic phenomena a second time (such as doubles while using a psy power unfettered) a second phenomena will occur, as normal.
• Weak Warp: The warp has a harder time reaching this area. Take -20 on Focus Power Tests to manifest the power. If for any reason a psychic phenomena would occur (even if a power is pushed) it only has a 1-50% chance of actually occuring. If it does occur make a psychic phenomena check with -10 on the roll.
• Warp Ghost: The area is haunted by some strange entity that effects the warp. If any warp power is used apply the Psychic Phenomena of Mind Warp (a roll of 09-11) immediately. Also if a psychic phenomena would occur as a result of unfettered or pushing, it is rolled with a +20 to the psychic phenomena table. All Divination Discipline powers have +3 added to the Psy Rating.

These are just a few examples and I have used things like this before but not to limit psychers… more to add to the general theme of the mission they are on. I have not ran games at high ranks in Deathwatch (although I have had high rank ascended characters in my deathwatch games).