I'm fine with certain things being immunity ignoring. If it isn't warpfire but normal fire, that flame breath should probably burn.

But trying to lift you up with telekinesis? Trying to use a Force Weapon's effects on you? Or mind control? That should definitely be facing immunities.

On the other hand, the fact that you're not auto-screwed as a psyker for having one in the party ain't too bad.

Pariah rules would be awesome. Just for the super crazy parties that some people like to run.

I agree with Cynical Cat. The DH2 rules sound like they are intended to reflect a lower level untouchable. There is indeed a range of untouchable abilities: there is a reverse equivalent of the graded "Alpha-Omega" scale used in Dan Abnett's Scarus Sector for untouchables

So I guess FFG have taken the option of a lower powered untouchable as a starter character.

However, as has been pointed out above, there are no canon sources for untouchables increasing their powers through training. (Arguably the "Pariah" books portray a school for untouchables, and Eisenhorn had his distaff of course, but I never read either institution as training untouchables in the use of their powers: rather they were trained in skills which complemented their innate abilities.) Pariahs/nulls/untouchables are very much portrayed as innately gifted individuals whose "powers" fall on a scale from minor creepiness to Alpha grade psyker killers.

So FFG have 2 choices:-

1. stick to the canon and run weak untouchables like the ones said to be in the Beta that can't be upgraded, and as a result get whined at by the community, or

2. bend the canon and develop a rationale and system for developing and training untouchables to have greater powers. And then get whined at by the community, because that's how the community works.(No one ever said being a game developer was fair.)

Personally, I'm easy with either option, though the latter seems more ambitious and interesting.

I wonder if they should hold off addressing untouchables in the core Rulebook until justice can be done to them properly, perhaps in a dedicated psyker book? The proposed rules don't seem wildly popular, and there's always the added risk that the next Dan Abnett Pariah trilogy sequel will invalidate the canon basis set out in the book. Rather than run sawn off untouchable rules that then have to be revised at a later date, hold off until they can be given the full attention they deserve?

Edit: Bear in mind I haven't read the Beta yet!

I don't mind them bending the canon in whatever way, I do mind FFG expecting my players to spend above 1000 exp to have an effect comparable with a null rod.

One issue I have with the rules as written: being an Untouchable/Null/Pariah is genetic. You are born with the gene and your power level is set.

In these rules, not only do you grow in Untouchable-ness, you also don't even need to buy it at CharGen.

I say remove the tree, make the advance cost 400 or 500xp, and give it its old rules, including the Fel penalty.

First off Ravenors Null got burned out by Zael who was copying (think wydow from X-men but psychically) the abilitys of a demon prince, a hugely powerful demonic sorcery wielding entity, that was possessing Carl, not a standard psyker.

Secondly, Ravenor and the other inquisitor formed a mind link with the chaos titan, and hoped when Bequin touched the channeling rod her untouchable force would affect it negatively, they did not do anything to Bequin with psychic power at all, it did nothing to it because it was a vast mechanical multi mind and the backlash of her nullifying the two psykers link with the titan catapulted her across the room and into the stone wall.

Thirdly, Untouchables have always been IMMUNE to psychic powers and have nullified the use of psychic powers around them, the only variable in any lore/fluff or cannon was the range in which they had this effect, IE: WP bonus defining range.

First paragraph agrees with me. If you're sufficiently strong then you can overcome an Untouchable.

Second, your own words have Bequin getting cooked by psychic backlash and thus agreeing that psychic power can affect an Untouchable.

Third: No. Necron Pariahs were never immune in fluff or rules. The Inquisitor skirmish game that introduced them merely said Untouchables were disruptive and came in variable strengths with particularly powerful ones being called Pariahs. Thirdly, you admit that Bequin got cooked by psychic backlash and that Ravenors Null got overpowered.

First off Ravenors Null got burned out by Zael who was copying (think wydow from X-men but psychically) the abilitys of a demon prince, a hugely powerful demonic sorcery wielding entity, that was possessing Carl, not a standard psyker.

Secondly, Ravenor and the other inquisitor formed a mind link with the chaos titan, and hoped when Bequin touched the channeling rod her untouchable force would affect it negatively, they did not do anything to Bequin with psychic power at all, it did nothing to it because it was a vast mechanical multi mind and the backlash of her nullifying the two psykers link with the titan catapulted her across the room and into the stone wall.

Thirdly, Untouchables have always been IMMUNE to psychic powers and have nullified the use of psychic powers around them, the only variable in any lore/fluff or cannon was the range in which they had this effect, IE: WP bonus defining range.

First paragraph agrees with me. If you're sufficiently strong then you can overcome an Untouchable.

Ravenor's Untouchable was immune to psychic abilities. It took months for him to be worn down by a demon prince to the point where he was susceptible. But he started out immune.

Really guys, we're bringing **** Abnett into this? Seriously?

Perhaps a better example of an Untouchable, that doesn't require loads of mental acrobatics to understand, is Jurgen* from the Cain series. Sure, he may not be an especially "powerful" psychic blank, but then again, nothing really overpowers him either. While I'm pretty sure the psychic dead-zone he generates is only very small as Cain has to stand very close to him, the fact of the matter is that it's still a psychic dead-zone; it's enough to give the daemon in The Traitor's Hand pause for thought and cause Amberley's pet psyker to have a huge panic attack (and, on the other end of the scale, inhibit the psy-negative effect of a Necron Pariah).

*Jurgen may not explicitly be named as an Untouchable, given that it's all from Cain's POV and he only knows what Amberley's been willing to tell him, but I think it's pretty obvious what Jurgen's supposed to be.

I personally don't see why Untouchable can't just be a single trait rather than having its own talent tree, as the idea of an Untouchable further developing his own Untouchability is rather jarring.

First off Ravenors Null got burned out by Zael who was copying (think wydow from X-men but psychically) the abilitys of a demon prince, a hugely powerful demonic sorcery wielding entity, that was possessing Carl, not a standard psyker.

Secondly, Ravenor and the other inquisitor formed a mind link with the chaos titan, and hoped when Bequin touched the channeling rod her untouchable force would affect it negatively, they did not do anything to Bequin with psychic power at all, it did nothing to it because it was a vast mechanical multi mind and the backlash of her nullifying the two psykers link with the titan catapulted her across the room and into the stone wall.

Thirdly, Untouchables have always been IMMUNE to psychic powers and have nullified the use of psychic powers around them, the only variable in any lore/fluff or cannon was the range in which they had this effect, IE: WP bonus defining range.

First paragraph agrees with me. If you're sufficiently strong then you can overcome an Untouchable.

Ravenor's Untouchable was immune to psychic abilities. It took months for him to be worn down by a demon prince to the point where he was susceptible. But he started out immune.

If you can be worn down by the warp powers of an entity, you're not immune by definition. If he was immune to warp powers then he wouldn't have been affected at all.

Really guys, we're bringing **** Abnett into this? Seriously?

Perhaps a better example of an Untouchable, that doesn't require loads of mental acrobatics to understand, is Jurgen* from the Cain series. Sure, he may not be an especially "powerful" psychic blank, but then again, nothing really overpowers him either. While I'm pretty sure the psychic dead-zone he generates is only very small as Cain has to stand very close to him, the fact of the matter is that it's still a psychic dead-zone; it's enough to give the daemon in The Traitor's Hand pause for thought and cause Amberley's pet psyker to have a huge panic attack (and, on the other end of the scale, inhibit the psy-negative effect of a Necron Pariah).

*Jurgen may not explicitly be named as an Untouchable, given that it's all from Cain's POV and he only knows what Amberley's been willing to tell him, but I think it's pretty obvious what Jurgen's supposed to be.

I personally don't see why Untouchable can't just be a single trait rather than having its own talent tree, as the idea of an Untouchable further developing his own Untouchability is rather jarring.

You're right in the money, Lucinus.

An Untouchable does not grow in power, and (barring one example from fluff of dubious caninocity, involving a Greater Daemon and a type of psyker that has never existed outside of that book) is immune to the effects if the Warp.

It should be a "spend xp at Character Creation to get this static Trait."

I provided two canon examples of Untouchables not being less than immune to the warp. Please don't disregard Madam Bequin. As for Abnett, he's one of the most prolific writers of material concerning the Untouchables. Jurgen is a minor supportinig character with plot convenient psychic disruption. Abnett has several major Untouchable characters, including the protagonist of a novel.

They canonically come in variable strengths and the descriptions of their powers in the Inquisitor game in which they were introduced certainly didn't say blanket immunity. It did say they disrupt the warp around them.

Now I'm of two minds about the new Untouchable rules. One is that the fellowship penalty and being effictively immune were easy to handle. The problem with them was they made warp nastiness less scary and that harms the atmosphere of the game. I'm not opposed to the idea that Untouchability being developed with xp because we do the same **** thing with psykers.

I provided two canon examples of Untouchables not being less than immune to the warp. Please don't disregard Madam Bequin. As for Abnett, he's one of the most prolific writers of material concerning the Untouchables. Jurgen is a minor supportinig character with plot convenient psychic disruption. Abnett has several major Untouchable characters, including the protagonist of a novel.

They canonically come in variable strengths and the descriptions of their powers in the Inquisitor game in which they were introduced certainly didn't say blanket immunity. It did say they disrupt the warp around them.

Now I'm of two minds about the new Untouchable rules. One is that the fellowship penalty and being effictively immune were easy to handle. The problem with them was they made warp nastiness less scary and that harms the atmosphere of the game. I'm not opposed to the idea that Untouchability being developed with xp because we do the same **** thing with psykers.

I wish you would stop going on about Bequin, she is a strong enough null to prevent a demonhost demon prince of unimaginable power from using its powers on multiple occasions, what should have happened was when she started moving towards Ravenor and the other inquisitor, nothing happened because she had nullified there psychic's powers, but that makes for a pretty dull story, so it was nothing more than artistic license.

And the one that affected the other null was a demon of such magnitude it would have ended the imperium of man if it had not been stopped from manifesting completely, I'd say that is way outside the remit of the usual level of pyskers any where in the 40k universe.

It is a terrible idea, and it has been implemented horribly to boot, in this new proposed system.

... Ravenor and another Inquisitor were able to brute force psychicly project Becquin's mind into a Chaos Titan in an attempt to down it and the backlash is what made it necessary to put her in medical stasis...

My o.c.d. is compelling me to point out that it was Eisenhorn, not Ravenor, who put Bequin into a coma, in the early chapters of the book Malleus .

Now carry on...

Perhaps a RANGE of "strengths" of an untouchable static trait could be used at character creation?

Untouchable being the weakest with moderate fel penalties and some psychic suppression abilities, for a low xp cost.

Then a more powerful version, Null, with higher xp cost, more severe psychic suppression etc

And finally a true "Pariah" option with an xp cost so high that the character effectively has to be built around the trait. Characterised by massive fel penalties, perhaps insanity points for psykers, and crushing penalties for any psychic activity in their presence.

This route offers players a range of play options without the (arguably) canon-breaking concept of "training" an untouchable to have greater powers.

Just a thought! :-)

While trying to keep spoilers to a minimum, there's a line in the back-of-the-book adventure that says, if the warband has an Untouchable in it, the fight "should be upgraded to include non-psychic threats such as Heavies."

So not only is the value of sinking XP into the Untouchable Advance debatable in the first place, but the adventure gseems to be suggesting, as a design choice, that things should and will be made harder for parties with an Untouchable in it.

That's reasonable. GMs should provide a reasonable challenge to the players. That means letting their special traits come in handy, but not letting those traits wipe the floor with all opposition. I assume the enemies in that section were all psychic, right? In that case I totally agree with adding some mundane enemies. It means the untouchable can easily ruin the psykers' day without dominating the fight.

Untouchables and Pariahs are just two different words for the same thing.

It's not new fluff for psychic blanks to have varying grades of power, and if you'll take another look at it you'll all see it too. And that the variance of power runs the gamut.

The powerful ones get snapped up by the Offio Assassanorium when they can pull it off, because they're the ones whom the power manifests so strongly that they can snuff out the very lives of psykers, in addition to their abilities.

It's not binary, where all blanks have the exact same suite of powers, immunity included, though I'd imagine most have that one.

But then I wonder about that again...

Culexus Assassins, the poster-child of the untouchables, is not immune to psychic powers. These are tabletop rules only, and I am loathe to apply them as anything other than a rough advisory guideline when it comes to those things (unlike those who rant about Bolters and Power Armor not all being equal because they are on the TT).

So maybe not -all- of them should be immune, at least.

That said there's plenty of good reasons for making untouchable something other than a single purchase at character creation. Like that it kinda sucks to have to spend all your starting XP on it. Likewise the simple fact that people got used to psykers 'growing more powerful' proves that a similar system for untouchables isn't out of the question. As with psykers, no one wanted to have to roll a die (or whatever) to determine what their PR would be forever.

That's reasonable. GMs should provide a reasonable challenge to the players. That means letting their special traits come in handy, but not letting those traits wipe the floor with all opposition. I assume the enemies in that section were all psychic, right? In that case I totally agree with adding some mundane enemies. It means the untouchable can easily ruin the psykers' day without dominating the fight.

How so? What effect would an Untouchable have on a fight with psykers? This is the starting adventure, the earliest an untouchable gets any Psy-effecting abilities is at 700xp dedicated solely to the talent tree and however many more xp would be required to increase Willpower to 45. And even then the range is only 4 meters, only reduces Psy Rating by 1, and all the NPCs in question have psy ratings of 2 or 4.

I'll be honest, at the point I wrote that post, I hadn't really more than glanced at the Untouchable rules. They are pretty wimpy!