So in my game I have a Heretek who has bought all knowledges in the game, this has also enabled him to get to the point where he is not only aligned, but going to be marked by Tzeentch. Obviously this isn't all that unusual.

The issue I have is that Tzeentch is the chaos god of Change, Evolution, Intrigue and Sorcery. For obvious reasons of ease (and super stereotype) Fantasy Flight have chosen only the Sorcery angle to be reflected by the mark but they left it open to DM tweaking (all marks have that line item of "+whatever the DM deems appropriate"). Being that the Heretek will get the mark via a collection of esoteric knowledges it seems strange to go the sorcery angle rather than something else (especially as he has the machine trait and is thus almost 100% artificial).

So we've been discussing ideas for alternate marks and have come up with some possibilities:

Complete Knowledge
-unnatural Int (+2)
-Know all knowledge skills. Any known knowledge skill gets +20 OR ignore the -20 when using an untrained skill OR see someone do something and then be able to do it just as well for the next X period of time (a mimic, similar to the marine ability when they eat someone).

Changer of Ways
- Gain 1 reroll per session, which can be used after determining the result of a dice roll. This can also be used to reroll a reroll.
~basically able to see a small amount of the future

Wyrd
-unnatural Int (+1)
-can gain a limited set of powers as wyrd powers (as per Dark Heresy) with wyrd level= INT
~ These should be powers that are more a representation of his supreme understanding that appear supernatural. Telepathy, Prescience and potentially telekinesis.

Supreme Intellect
- unnatural Int (+1)
- If they can contemplate for 1 round, can replace any check with an INT check.
~ Represents his understanding of everything being applied with Tzeentch's guiding hand, letting him see the right path to take.

Any suggestions to refine the above options, discount them, offer alternatives would be awesome!

Slylizard said:

He probably already has good cr Cerebral Implants (you can get them at character creation) which already gives unnatural Int (+2) +20 to lore skills and Infused Knowledge which gives him common and scholaristic lore skills at trained and is also tzeentch advancement. I also imagint that he has quite a lot of forbidden lore skills as they are easy way for tzeentch points. So unless he choose very different approach in getting the mark, many of these bonuses will be wasted.

Slylizard said:

That one is ok. Give him one more imfamy point or let him reroll one of the dices at any test. You can aso give gim an equivalent of one divination power which he activates by testing WP with or without a chance of phenomena.

Slylizard said:

Slylizard said:

That one is also ok, meabby tie it with Foresight talent because it looks like an evolution of it and it would give better understanding of when it could be used (he shouldnt be able to swap WS/BS with INT in combat for example).

Also my candidate to the list

Supreme Understanding
- unnatural Int (+1)
~ he has such an understanding of universe around him, that we can change it with a thought
- by passing forbidden lore (warp) -30 and spending imfamy point he can perform what would be miracles (meaby duplicate an effect of some other skill/ talent. He could pass a skill test, gain a talent for when it is needed).

Slylizard said:

In the Tome of Fate, the newest Tzeentch-based supplement, there is a archetype for mortals that is a Heretek(the Idolitrex Magos of Forge Polix) who has gained psychic powers and psy rating due to his study of esoteric and occult knowledge. Basically he has decided that the best way to do SCIENCE! is to innovate and experimentate and thus its only logical to harness the powers of the warp to your own bidding to understand the cosmos better. And of course superior steel can better harness the powers of the warp than mere flesh

And no, I don't really see why the reason you get Mark should really drastically change the benefits you get from it, after all its not something you "gain" as such but something that is indeed Gifted to you by the Weaver of Fate, the Master of All, the Grand Schemer and Lord of Change. What better way is there to change your fate and to understand the hidden threads that bind all things to His will in the tapestry of Fate than by being able to harness the powers of the warp.

Also Tzeentch finds it hilarious when his followers overextend their reach, believing themselves All-Knowing and All-powerful and make their heads explode with the very powers that have been gifted to them to better understand how insignificant they are in the Great Scheme.

Having said all that, I think the Changer of Ways, Supreme Intellect and Supreme Understanding are quite nice altho they do need some crunching. Maybe also change the names a bit since there are already gifts called Changing of the Ways and Massive Intellect. Complete Knowledge is pretty much redundant/imbalanced since you already can get all skills to +30. I think having a +50 to all knowledge skills would be pretty.. well, I don't really know how I or my gaming group would find that fun, why even play if you can't fail?

Remember also that if you are going to make cool alternatives to a god-specific Gift, it might make your other players left out.

Alternative way of looking at things, the current mark of Tzeench is actually *amazingly good* for non-psykers, because it's the only way they can currently get access to the Psyker trait. What Heretek could resist the urge to expand their field of experimentation into the Warp itself?

Thanks all, appreciate the thought. Apologies for the formatting, quote tags are failing for me.

"In the Tome of Fate, the newest Tzeentch-based supplement, there is a archetype for mortals that is a Heretek(the Idolitrex Magos of Forge Polix) who has gained psychic powers and psy rating due to his study of esoteric and occult knowledge. Basically he has decided that the best way to do SCIENCE! is to innovate and experimentate and thus its only logical to harness the powers of the warp to your own bidding to understand the cosmos better. And of course superior steel can better harness the powers of the warp than mere flesh
And no, I don't really see why the reason you get Mark should really drastically change the benefits you get from it, after all its not something you "gain" as such but something that is indeed Gifted to you by the Weaver of Fate, the Master of All, the Grand Schemer and Lord of Change. What better way is there to change your fate and to understand the hidden threads that bind all things to His will in the tapestry of Fate than by being able to harness the powers of the warp.
Also Tzeentch finds it hilarious when his followers overextend their reach, believing themselves All-Knowing and All-powerful and make their heads explode with the very powers that have been gifted to them to better understand how insignificant they are in the Great Scheme."

My Tome of Fate is in the mail still, so I’ll definitely check that out when it arrives!

Regarding the rest maybe my explanation sucked a little, let me try a bit more detail. There are three reasons I wanted to change the Mark up:

1. I have a thing about automatons being able to access the warp. No matter how advanced they are it feels weird for a machine to be a psyker (despite Tzeentch stepping in). The heretek already has the Machine trait (twice) so it’d feel off adding the psyker trait too.
2. The other marks enhance the abilities the character already has rather than adding something overly new. Khorne gets killier, Nurgle gets tougher, etc. I wanted to replicate that here and have this particular mark make him smarter (which fits in nicely with Tzeentch as the sinister planner too). This is also why I’m not worried about the others (psyker, Khorne melee specialist, unaligned party face) because the marks for them are highly appropriate and really what they want.
3. I want to avoid having this character completely haemorrhaging xp. As the high INT player they already have to focus on medicae, tech-use, security, knowledges and some sort of combat ability. Adding psy-rating ans powers to that list makes their life extremely difficult.

"Alternative way of looking at things, the current mark of Tzeench is actually *amazingly good* for non-psykers, because it's the only way they can currently get access to the Psyker trait. What Heretek could resist the urge to expand their field of experimentation into the Warp itself?"

That’s true. As I said before though I have this thing about machines accessing the warp. But besides that it really doesn’t suit the character (and unlike “gifts” this is supposed to be a reward). The heretek’s major goal is complete replacement of flesh with machine (hence multiple levels of the machine trait and numerous augments). The thought of rewarding the character with a physical connection to anything feels kind of off too.

"Supreme Understanding
- unnatural Int (+1)
~ he has such an understanding of universe around him, that we can change it with a thought
- by passing forbidden lore (warp) -30 and spending infamy point he can perform what would be miracles (meaby duplicate an effect of some other skill/ talent. He could pass a skill test, gain a talent for when it is needed)."

Not a bad idea, I’ll add this one to the list to discuss with the guys.

Slylizard said:

I see where you're coming from, but I actually think machines accessing the Warp is much more canon than you might think. There's Daemon engines for a start, and then there's Wraithbone - a lot of Eldar technology is specifically based on conducting psychic energy.

It's true that Necrons have no warp presence, but I took that as being because they have no souls, not just because they're machines. After all, if a machine can't access the Warp, then a Heretek wouldn't be able to have a Mark of Chaos *at all*.

Incidentally, it strikes me that a minor problem with the way Hereteks work in game is that - technically speaking - Tech Heresy can be wholly unrelated to Chaos (it sounds like the character you're playing is this kind of Heretek, but I could be wrong).

I'm also not sure I agree that the other marks of Chaos necessarily give you "more" rather than "different" (although even if this was the case, "different" makes a certain amount of sense for the Lord of Change), rather I think that all of the marks of Chaos make you better at doing the things which a *very stereotypical* follower of that God is good at. The Mark of Khorne makes you better at melee combat, the Mark of Nurgle makes you tougher, the Mark of Slaanesh makes you better at social stuff, the Mark of Tzeench makes you a better psyker. But it's quite possible that you could be playing a follower of Khorne who specializes in ranged combat (although I admit that this would be difficult under the actual system, since Khorne gets no shooty Talents) or Leadership, or a follower of Nurgle who specializes in Medicae, and you can certainly build a melee-focused follower of Slaanesh who wasn't remotely interested in influencing people socially.

I'm genuinely a bit torn about this, because part of me feels that it's a bad idea to make the Marks of Chaos another character-optimization tool - if everybody could choose a "version" of the Mark of Chaos that best fit their build, it would lead to every Archetype having a no-brainer Mark to aim for, on the other hand if Marks only have one version, it means that players are penalized for playing non-stereotypical followers of the Chaos Gods. On the third, mutant hand I'm a bit uncomfortable with the idea that one should expect every character build to be optimal.

I appreciate that you're worried about spreading yourself too thin, but you get your first point of Psy Rating for free and if you stick with Divination and Telepathy powers you could pick up some good flavour abilities relatively cheaply and without (I think) compromising your concept of the character.

I may be off on this, but I got the impression that you need the psyker trait to perform rituals. If that is correct, having the vanilla mark of Tzeentch would allow the party member with the superior Forbidden Knowledge (Warp or Daemonology) (assumption being the acquisition of good cerebral implants and a proclivity towards intelligence advances) be the character whose skill is tested rather than the psyker or sorcerer could be an enormous boon. Binding the warp entity is a different story, however.

You don't need Psyker, but it provides a bonus

Seems to me that if his ultimate goal is the complete replacement of his weak flesh, then he should also welcome the gifts that the warp can provide. Only the warp can give his new, stronger flesh a sort of living quality. If his brain is entirely replaced, then it is up to his "soul" to carry on whatever makes him special. Otherwise he is just a robot. His implants and machine traits could be enhanced by what the warp offers. I think it is something a character like that would have to consider before taking that final step into becoming a machine. Does he cease to be a player character if he is nothing more than metal? If he can transcend his mortality, and then use the warp to repossess his metallic shell, perhaps that is the only real way to rid himself of all his flesh.

my view is Tzeentch and in fact his three ipsofacto Brothers are for all indents and purposes gods they can do what the hell they like to those who follow them

There was a tech priest in the Inquisitor games that were printed in White Dwarf that was turned into a psyker through warp exposure… There is a Gift in BC that turns the recipient into a complete machine, Mechanoid.

There is alot of fluff that hints at tech priests and those like them are very rarely psykers, since their extensive cyberfication makes them less able to channel the warp effeciently. But even then there are cyborgs in novels that are nascent psykers and become possessed because of their budding psychic gifts. Add Sorcery to this, which does not require a psykers gift to start with just a very great understanding of the warp, occult practices and potentially daemonology to use. And then there is of course the heretek archetype in Tome of Fate, which INHO very much uses "Sorcery".

But anything with a warp presence, ie a soul, can be a psyker - even something more machine than man, especially of the ruinous powers themselves think it would be a fun idea.

But in the end, in your game whatever floats your boat is good.

Since you say he learned all the knowledge skills, how about the mark lets him make greater use of those knowledge skills. Have the mark let him use the appropriate knowledge skill in place of an interaction test to manipulate a person or group (charm or intimidate, etc.)

Its cannon in extreemfor machines to be able to use psy ratings look up psychic servotors, they are something the mechanicus made to aid them in there own schemes and travels,