40K: On The Ruinous (Psychic) Powers
Come take a look at the ruinous powers of the Ruinous…Powers.
Chaos is at home in the Warp. The denizens of the Immaterium should therefore have some psychic might at their disposal. Psykers being part and parcel of the Warp and all, and that’s not even mentioning Tzeentch, whose name is synonymous with Brimstone Horrors, except those got nerfed, so it’s back to psychic powers again.
And in the Chaos Daemons Codex, there are some pretty cool powes on display. The are 18 in total, 6 for each of the powers. And Khorne players will continue to take in allies for their psychic boons, all the while pretending that 1 extra attack on the charge is worth it. So with that in mind let’s dive right in.
Tzeentch
The Lord of Change has some particularly chaotic powers at his disposal.
Infernal Gateway is a nice Smite alternative. It hits a relatively wide away, and if your opponent is playing clumped up, say to benefit from the auras of multiple characters, you can really put a hurting on your enemy’s support network–though it does require your psyker to be in there, where is not very safe.
This one is just good times had by all. A bonus to wound from the psychic phase? Now it can only go to your Tzeentch Daemon units, but if you can combo that with some of the more accessible toughness reducing powers–mmm, can you taste that Chaos soup?
Finally we get to my favorite. This isn’t the most practical of powers, especially since it only works on characters, and then only if you beat their leadership on 2d6, but it feels good to steal your opponent’s models. That time you take control of a captain, or better yet Guilliman/Magnus/Mortarion because your opponent picked a smaller less targetable as his warlord for some warlord trait/kill point shenanigans, is going to make every other time this power fails feel worth it.
Nurgle
Everyone loves Nurgle. And with these psychic powers is easy to see why.
This one’s from the Nurgle associated Dark Hereticus discipline, but is nevertheless still good. Make your enemies sad while you lurch across the table at them.
Oof. +1 to wound rolls in the fight phase and double damage on a 7+? Well, assuming Mortarion continues to count as a Nurse Daemon (he does and likely will), Morty just got a new best friend. He’s already reducing toughness, now let’s ice that cake.
Speaking of icing and reducing toughness, did you want another way to reduce an enemy’s toughness? Because you’ve got it.
Slaanesh
Finally we come to Slaanesh, who, despite hanging out in the back seat these days, is still having a grand old time.
Ah Delightful Agonies, friend of Chaos Marines and Daemon alike. Again, we’ve seen it before, but it’s still a handy tool, especially since Slaanesh units tend to be rather fragile.
Ordinarily I’d turn my nose up at leadership decreasing powers, but these can help you polish off units in morale and more importantly can help a nice undivided list take over characters more reliably. Now this one is kind of special because it only works within 12″ of your psyker, but it hits all enemy units so, pretty good.
And then of course there’s the Pavane of Slaanesh which is a great weapon to bring to bear on larger units, doubly so if you can just roll sixes on command. If you can pick a big host of enemies like a Death Company assault ball, or a big unit of Genestealers or one of the other ‘bigger is better’ units, you can get a lot of value.
At any rate, these are just some of the powers in the new book. You can find the rest within its pages, or check us out on Twitch where we are putting the Chaos Daemon Codex through the ringer and answering your questions.
In the meantime, what do you think of these powers? Disappointing or disappointingly OP?
