Interesting points - I will have to check StH but I thought the psyker was trained by the Inquisitor whilst they were "involved" and not actaully sanctioned? Probably getting old and misrembering!

Alot of what you say makes excellent sense but a few other things into the mixing pot for how the Inquisitor handles the situtation

I am not sure that information on Acolytes and the Inquisitors staff is kept by the "Inquisition" - but that may be just my game where perhaps Inquisitors are usually much more independant free agents...........

if said Adept goes off for testing - is it not equally likely that he might just end up being ground up to feed the Emperor?

the Adept may well reveal things that the Inquistor does not want reveealed in the sanctioning process?

I agree the Inquisitor needs a good reason to sidestep sanctioning but I think it can be there - given that his once useful tool/ source of information / valued undering or even friend could be destoryed by the process. On the other hand he or she may feel its not worth the effort and have them killed to avoid being used against him?

I think the Inquisitor is just as likely to handle the issue "in house" whether that be training him or her (esp if the Inqusitor is a Psyker), attempting to have the Psychic bit cut out or execution as sending them off for Sanctioning - where all sorts of issues may arise and they may not actually be of any use any more?

nice description of the date storage etc ideas by the way - most interesting - thanks

Well actually yes there is a huge database that contains virtually all information. What did you think the Administratum did? It is not so much centralized as nodal (by sector) with out of sector queries having to be relayed by astropath. Without the ability to query/search all that data it would be worthless, and so would the adept class. You forget the actual level of technology involved (very high), to say nothing of the mainframes that run it all (most likely left over from the DAOT.

I thought the Administratum is busy enough with the important stuff like moving armies, registering the tithes and making sure non-selfsufficient worlds don't spontaneously starve. One thing the Imperium never struck me as was a modern police state. You get denunciation and helplessness of the citizen versus the system, but the actual level of information the Imperium has about its citizens is pretty low - in fact, most worlds don't even notice its existence that much beyond the regular tithes and guard drafts.

Even if there is such a data base, the number of Astropaths are quite low. Considering their bandwidth is rather limited (by the number of messages that causes their head to explode), you'd need a pretty serious doubt about a specific person to use astropathic communication.

Finally, daBoss raises another point: Psykers are valuable and only IIRC one in a hundred makes it back from Terra. The chances that the adept is not among them are therefore rather high.

The Radical's Handbook, page 149:

" The Question of Psychic Adepts
The Adept Career Path presented in the Dark Heresy Rulebook includes Advances in two of its ranks (Loremaster on page 48 and Magister on page 49 of the Career Paths chapter) that give an Adept character the ability to become a psyker in middle of a campaign. These Advances were intended to represent these characters gaining psychic ability through studying occult mysteries and forbidden lore. It does, however, raise the question of whether these psychic
adepts are sanctioned and where their power comes from. Three options for how you may want to deal with these questions are presented here:

Sorcery: The psychic powers open to Loremasters and Magisters are in fact knowledge of sorcery gained through forbidden research. Swap the Loremaster’s Psy-Rating 1 Advance for Sorcery and add in Forbidden Lore (Warp) (Int) and Forbidden Lore (Warp) (Int) +10 as two advances for 100 points each. In the Magister rank, remove the Minor Psychic Power and Psy-Rating 2 Advances and swap the Psy-Rating 3 Advance for Master Sorcerer.

Sanctioned Psyker: When the Adept takes the Loremaster Psy-Rating 1 Advance, they are trained and sanctioned as a psyker. The character takes a suitable time out from play and gains the Sanctioned Psyker Trait (see page 26 of the Dark Heresy Rulebook).

Rogue Psyker: Rather than taking a psy-rating, an Adept who passes through the Loremaster Rank may become a Nascent Psyker (see pages 89-90 of The Inquisit or’s Handbook). If the psychic power involved is suitably ‘discreet,’ the character may not even be aware that he possesses it, (although of course the player does!), and wield it subconsciously, simply believing it to be a ‘knack’ or good fortune, at least at the beginning…"

Hope that helps. And yes, I think it's not too far-fetched for an Adept to unlock his psychic potential through contemplation and study. While sorcery sounds very logical and fitting, there's nothing contrary to just plain "psychic" awakening. Some people possess the Psyker gene, but manifest their powers much later into their lives. Most Psykers manifest powers in adolescence, but not all, so the sanctioning option is perfectly viable.

I'm not a fan of necroing old topics, but I just wanted to give an example of how you can sanction an adept with an Ascension package, an experience of mine from last year playing an adept-turned-psyker - just to give you an idea of how I transitioned from adept to "psyker". My character was a voidborn adept who grew up on a rogue trader ship and was a heretical visionary who thought psykers are the next evolutionary step for humanity and that the Imperium should breed psykers so that they can evolve to resist the natural corruptive nature of the warp. She even started as a curious and knowledge obsessed Wyrd, so her entire theme was centered around psykers, psychic potential and knowledge.

The way I approached my GM with this is that I asked him for an elite advance package to represent my sanctioning process and my trip to Terra - I proposed to take the "Mind's Eye Opens" general transition package from DH: Ascension, page 48. From the beginning I've told my GM I will pursue the Loremaster advances and that I'm not interested in playing a malefic scholar-sorcerer, and since my theme was consistent throughout the game, he agreed - after all, if I'm to be sent for Sanctioning and miss sessions, and thus experience, why not simply invest the missed xp? Also, our Inquisitor had radical leanings so that helped.

So, after I bought Psy Rating 1 and waited until an agreed moment in our campaign, we roleplayed a cool conversation with my Inquisitor and my character was sent off to Terra, VIP express. The package gave me +1 psy rating, one major and two minor psychic powers, increased age by 1d5 and decreased toughness by 1d5. We agreed that I would miss a number of sessions equal to 400 xp, and then my character was returned. I also asked my GM to adjust the last two ranks of my advance to reflect my increased potential and knowledge - he allowed me to purchase Forbidden Lore (Psyker, Warp), Favored by the Warp, Invocation and Discipline Focus, since it made sense for the character to have these, or strive to have them. The costs were equal to or more expensive by 100xp than the relevant Psyker ones. And then we changed the Adept advances "Psy rating 2" and "Psy rating 3" to "Psy rating 3" and "Psy rating 4" respectively. This gave me a slight power increase in the final stages of the game, but it wasn't dramatic and ended up less powerful than pure psykers. Since I focused on Divination and Telepathy anyway, these powers synergized with the adept background very well.

So, there you go, a case for using the Ascension package to mechanically transition your character from Adept to Psyker. It just made perfect sense, given the package is explicitly designed for inquisition acolytes who discover psychic power in them and which then go on to become sanctioned psykers. It also ensures the xp you're going to miss is invested somewhere else, since your character will be tutored, indoctrinated and tested while he/she is out of play.