Warpcraft Secondaries

[MillionsSons]

Hey guys Warpcraft secondaries, what are your thoughts?

 

My first feeling: it's kinda amazing that we are one of the few strong psychic faction and yet this warpcraft secondaries completely work against us.

 

1- MENTAL INTERROGATION

PROGRESSIVE OBJECTIVE

Score 3VPs each time you successfully complete the following psychic action:

One PSYKER CHARACTER from your army can attempt to perform this psychic

action in your Psychic phase if it is within 18” of any enemy CHARACTER models.

 

--> This is where we are supposed to score points... but... it can be denied, and that means we need to deactivate a character at least 5 times to score 15 points. 

With ZERO benefits on the battlefield while the battle is raging. Ie it's a trade off: do my sorcerer try to score 3 points or do I need my sorcer's damage output ?

 

2 - PSYCHIC RITUAL

END GAME OBJECTIVE

Score 15VPs at the end of the battle if any unit from your army successfully

completed the following psychic action 3 times during the battle:

One PSYKER CHARACTER unit from your army can attempt to perform this psychic

action in your Psychic phase if it is within 6” of the centre of the battle!eld.

 

 

--> very situational in my view, will do it only according to the dynamic of the game... i.e. when I will have the board control. Against shooting army, for example, I DMC 10 SOTs in the center and a sorcerer fly there behind them... maybe I can score like this.

Against a CC army, like SW, Khorne etc... no way it is even possible.

 

 

3- ABHOR THE WITCH

END GAME OBJECTIVE

You cannot select this Secondary Objective if your army includes any PSYKER

units. Score 5VPs at the end of the battle for each enemy PSYKER CHARACTER

that is destroyed, and 3VPS for every other enemy PSYKER unit that is destroyed.

 

--> So the opponent get 15 point for free here. Worst part is that it's not even a trade off "points or managing the battle", the points come from killing...

 

 

 

[MasterDeath]

As far as I know psychic actions work different than actions. They only take the place of a single manifestation.

 

1. Interrogation: Its great, just cast it either a. last, so the opponent has wasted dispels or b. first to draw a dispel

 

2. Ritual: How about a bunch of horros surrounding a herald? Summon in and let the Horrors multiply.

 

3. Abhor: Remember only armies without any psykers themselves can take this, so you get a 15 free VP by Interrogation etc. yourself.

[Xenith]

As far as I know psychic actions work different than actions. They only take the place of a single manifestation.

 

 

The rule says you can do a psychic action instead of casting *any* psychic powers. So with Ahriman, you can choose to attempt do one action or try to cast 3 powers.

[HighMarshalAmp]

At least my current list would give up a whole lot of flexibility to perform an action like that.

I'd need one unit to cast it and another one to screen it and take over just in case, all that on a silver platter in the middle of the board.

 

...guess I'll just try to go for the killy secondaries instead

[Dolchiate Remembrancer]

I like the idea and where it is moving the game.

I question whether we have the correct view of it.

In a game where both armies are focusing on VP instead of tabling each other, this sort of thing is great. But in a game where tabling is still the way to win, these are no good to us at all.

Im going to want to test them out before i make a verdict however.

[Xisor]

I suppose the big question is: are these for us?

 

Consider that other armies with psykers (e.g. Astra Militarum, Inquisition) have access to cheap psykers who aren't pivotal parts of their raison d'être. 

 

The Thousand Sons, on the other hand...

 

It's only of late that the Thousand Sons have been portrayed as psychic menaces to anyone other than themselves (chiefly).

 

Ahriman's Rubric, Magnus' Message to Terra were all catastrophic for the Scions of Prospero.

 

Magnus' machinations at Fenris in Wrath of Fenris were byzantine, but under the guise of an all-out assault on a Fortress Monastery.

 

Magnus' peculiar psychic pass-time at Ye Olde Prospero X Planet of the Sorcerers in Ritual of the Damned is very much on Magnus, and very much subject to disruption.

 

---

 

Otherwise, the history of the Thousand Sons is replete, to borrow from wise-words from an ancient on Warseer, with his many mishaps in trying to obtain a library card.

 

For the Thousand Sons' great history, it's acquiring lore, and grand conspiratorial things, or devious deceptions and setting Rubric Goldberg Machines running around the galaxy. Sometimes it's just trying to buy acquire an out-of-print or limited edition book.

 

Rarely, if ever, has the Thousand Sons' actual means of securing victory been by doing a specific psychic thing, at a specific time.

 

Accordingly, I think we've got it mixed up, although not quite as Dolchiate Remembrancer says. (Though it's a weighty consideration on its own merit!)

 

Better: psychic powers are the means by which the Thousand Sons engineering their victory - things like the Cult of Duplicity's Psychic Parachute power, or fiddly strange things, or just blasting people with untold mortal wounds from everywhere and anywhere...

 

The Psychic Objectives are, quite possibly, a distraction.

 

(And, interestingly, something that we'd be well placed to foil in the plans of others.)

[Archaeinox]

With less characters as a whole in 9th, unless spending ridiculous amounts of CP to take them, it's probably not very wise for us to take Mental Interrogation except under extreme circumstances where you can give up an entire psyker while he doesnt nothing except farm VP.

[MasterDeath]

 

As far as I know psychic actions work different than actions. They only take the place of a single manifestation.

 

 

The rule says you can do a psychic action instead of casting *any* psychic powers. So with Ahriman, you can choose to attempt do one action or try to cast 3 powers.

 

I didnt see the power*s*, how should I? I dont have the book. Then use a single cast Psyker for that job. Daemon Princes, Heralds or something.

Edited July 16, 2020 by MasterDeath

[Prot]

I have commented on this before at length in other TS threads so I'll keep this short:

 

- If I understand this Warpcraft "action" correctly, and as I have played it in a few games with my Thousand Sons, it's horrible unless you start creating subserviant Sorcs that are built for this purpose.

 

- The fact it can be denied stinks. No other action (that I can think of) gives a person a 'roll off' to cancel it. (IE: raise the banner)

 

- To otherwise take your most productive phase of your army, and effectively trade it in for 2 VP is just not something I'm ever going to do again. 

 

Unless I misinterpret "action" in this scenario (which is quite possible) I have found it too penal and in the two games I tried it, I found I stopped doing it, and ignored the action because it's just too penal. It's not like sitting 10 cultists on a home objective for a turn and telling them to twiddle their thumbs. Let's be honest, that's all they're good at. 

Edited July 16, 2020 by Prot

[Xenith]

 

 

As far as I know psychic actions work different than actions. They only take the place of a single manifestation.

 

 

The rule says you can do a psychic action instead of casting *any* psychic powers. So with Ahriman, you can choose to attempt do one action or try to cast 3 powers.

 

I didnt see the power*s*, how should I? I dont have the book. Then use a single cast Psyker for that job. Daemon Princes, Heralds or something.

 

 

Neither have I . The description is in another thread in this forum:

 

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/364810-thousand-sons-9th-edition-faction-focus-discussion/

[MasterDeath]

On another read, my above comment sounded more snarky then intended. Sorry for that. I really thought a psychic action would just take the place of a single manifestation, else the dispel would be way to harsh. I really like those Action-style VPs (raise the banner, ritual etc.) as they are very on the narrative side. But if it takes all manifestations, they are not very good. Except for a Heralds etc.

[Mordas]

As far as I know psychic actions work different than actions. They only take the place of a single manifestation.

 

1. Interrogation: Its great, just cast it either a. last, so the opponent has wasted dispels or b. first to draw a dispel

 

2. Ritual: How about a bunch of horros surrounding a herald? Summon in and let the Horrors multiply.

 

3. Abhor: Remember only armies without any psykers themselves can take this, so you get a 15 free VP by Interrogation etc. yourself.

3. This just makes me cry, I regularly play against Black Templars....

[Raven1]

An individual secondary is capped at 15. While against us it's easier to max, it won't win or lose the game single handedly.

[MillionsSons]

....

 

3. Abhor: Remember only armies without any psykers themselves can take this, so you get a 15 free VP by Interrogation etc. yourself.

 

I think you are missing the point, these 15 VPs are not free, it cost you 5 times a psycker not casting any spells. 5 smites, 5 others spells. It's a huge cost that might cost you the battlefield - and thereby your opponents will score even more because you haven't been able to remove enough models in his army