What if...instead of choosing which psychic powers your librarian, sorcerer, hive tyrant etc. had it was randomized, like (current) WHFB spells?
We already have examples in current rules, like the Inquisition Adversaries and random (per turn!) Weirdboy powers. But what if every psyker had to participate to some degree? No automatically getting Lash or JotWW? The Horror!
To make it work, we'd need a bunch more powers available for the most part. Some books already have a number of powers available, but you'd need to flesh out those possible for guys like IG Primaris Psykers.
What do you think? Should the psyker world be shaken up and force players on both sides to adjust a little more? Or are you horrified at the thought of not being able to buy a particular power your whole game plan centers on?
Which reminds me...for the next doubles tournament I go to I have to remember to make that double-lash, quad-JotWW team-up...
I like the idea of random power generation. It would give many players fits, especially the ones who have built their armies to utilize/abuse certain powers.
ReplyDeleteI doubt we will ever see it happen because it appears that GW is moving away from random anything and to a certain choice for a certain points. That way you only need to learn the couple choices that people use not the goofy ones people never take.
I don't think it'd work out very well.
ReplyDeleteI mean, it'd be a great way to prevent people from basing builds around specific powers... but it'd also be a great way to prevent people from basing builds around specific powers, if you know what I mean.
You can kind of get away with this in Fantasy, because 1) casters there to cast (as opposed to provide Dispel Dice) tend to have access to >50% of their spell list and 2) most spells, more or less, fill the same role: magic missile.
With 40K, powers can be so freaking diverse: a Librarian with Gate is going to fill a very different role in your army than a Librarian with Might.
While I can certainly empathize with wanting to cut back on the Lashes and Jaws seen on the table, making things more random doesn't make them better or more balanced... it just makes them more random.
2nd edition did random psychic powers. Up to 4 random powers, and force cards dealt out each psychic turn to charge up your powers. It was terrible.
ReplyDelete3rd Edition did it as well, with the introduction of "minor pscychic powers."
ReplyDeleteI actually liked the randomness it added to the game, but it was largely unappreciated by the masses as it wasn't dependable.
I dont think that random powers would be a bad thing although as a Guard player who hasnt yet used his Primaris I wouldnt have anything to worry about.
ReplyDeleteThey should maybe make it so that 1 of the powers was random, or that psykers all had random powers unless they paid an upgrade to mean they get to choose 1 or 2 of them.
Also the final comment in your post is just sooo wrong lol. I can jsut see it now, with you lashing two units into neat lines for 4 lines of Jotww... it makes we wince thinking about it lol.
@Kraggi - :-D
ReplyDeleteI agree with most folks that I don't really think it would work/go over well with most players. And it would indeed suck to be paired up against Tyranids and wind up with Machine Curse!
Could be fun to do with a tight gaming group though, make up some extra powers and see what shakes loose.