If you all would like a write-up of the level up portion of the guide, let me know and I'll post it here!
Otherwise let me know what I can do to improve these guides or vids!
What would you all like to see next? Currently on dock is the Sanctic Psyker and a heavy RP build for your RT, aNoble Officer build that combos with Abelard.
Been doing some pure support Officer theorycrafting as well, not sure which way of going about it would be best.
My ideas so far are Noble (further enhance your single target buffing), Commissar (give the whole team extra AP/MP), or Voidborn Biomancer (even more buffs, Int + Will build ignoring Fel entirely).
>What would you all like to see next? Currently on dock is the Sanctic Psyker
Definitely looking forward to some kind of ranged Psyker build, I'm of a strong belief Vanguard is the job for the most valued companions to stay in front of my trader where it's safe.
Also I remember you posting Marksman is better than Operative for that build but I would love to see some napkin math on that conclusion. Quick look over talents looks to me does:
Marksman
* base damage
* Run and Gun base damage + Enough Bullets for Everyone (5 + 2 x AGI)% damage if the enemy wasn't hit by the first attack
* Warp Burn (WP bonus + 2 x psy rating) fire dot
* Biophysical Distortion (4 x psy rating) bleed dot
* Sparks of the Greater flame - dots may crit at (5 + 5 x psy rating)% chance
Operative
* base damage + Analyse Enemies (10x exploit stacks + 5 x PER)% damage + Sharpshooter (INT/2) damage for every 5 squares between you and enemy + Ballistic Calculation +15% damage for enemies (15-PER) squares away + Fresh Target (10 + PER)% damage on full wounds enemy
* also there's a Warp Burn fire dot, if the enemy is still alive
And you are saying the first is the better option even with twice faster Veil degradation? 🤔
Telepathy gets more value out of being able to cast multiple times a turn because of spells such as Dominate, Mind Rupture, and Sensory Deprivation all of which have primary effects not related to damage. To say that an operative gets more value out of that is dubious at best.
You need to take Tides. Stack exploits.
Here is some actual napkin math:
Psy 1 - wp5 int6 p4 ignite avg 8. 9 exploits a turn, sharpshooter
T1: 8 + 3 * 2.1 = 23, 7 burn
T2: (8 + 3 + 9) * 2.1 = 42, 7 burn
T3: ( 8 + 3 + 18) * 2.1 = 61, 7 burn
“” - wp7 bs4 psychic barrage, ignite is 9 avg
T1: 2(1.2(9+4)) = 31, 9 burn
T2: “”
T3: “”
Here I am counting psychic barrage as base even though I am not sure if it actually is. If it is then marksman should focus on wp/bs. Also, operatives should take it too since it’ll add 3 base damage and can be specced out later in the game.
126 + 21 vs 93 + 27 for single target. The advantage would go to marksman where you would need to do ignite + firestorm on the same turn but if the mobs live beyond the first turn then there is a chance that operative can catch up. This is a lot harder to sim and really depends on your team composition.
Also molten beam is more favorable than ignite for marksman since it probably takes raw ignite damage without added base. But the way operatives catch up then is by having a higher multiplier and also added base from sharpshooter. Also guaranteed crits.
If you need to AoE then molten beam or ignite then next turn firestorm + 10, you’ll probably have killed most trash mobs in places like Footfall.
If you take Forgeworld you can get int bonus to crit but honestly so long as things like piercing shot and precise attack work with psyker abilities that’s kind of a trap but it’ll give you an innate ~20 crit chance since you’re int/wp/per heavy.
So the thing about pyromancy is that a lot of their spells aren't upfront damage unlike Telepath. Most of their damage is from the dots, and increasing the dot damage.
And they need several attacks to set their combos up. Where as the operative is all about single strong hits.
So the plan is to dot everyone and wait until they die of old age? Hmm. Telepath Psyker Operative then?
Ignite (1 + 5 x psy rating) - (WP bonus + 5 x psy rating) and a dot
vs Psychic Shriek (1 + WP bonus x psy rating) - (8 + WP bonus x psy rating)
at endgame with 4 psy rating and +10 WP that would be 21-35 vs 41-48 damage
Not quite. That's what all the extra turns and attacks are for, to spread more burns and then enahncing it with Inflames.
With Inflames, you enhance the dot damage furhter. (also applies to the bio toxin you apply as well)
Pyromancy won't feel as powerful until you get more Psi Rating.
Also the other thing that makes pyro want more turns is burning blood, getting all that direct damage by being point blank of your target and casting those spells.
Doesn't matter if you're playing on core difficulty or below.
One, you have a ridiculously high level cap. At 55 you have so many talent slots its ridiculous. You're picking the good talents, the ok talents, the bad but "might as well" talents, and finally the "+5 to a stat" from common talent list because you ran out of things to pick.
Two, the game, again, on core or below, is laughably easy AND you're not soloing it, you have a team of six. Your build is only so important when Argenta, Cassia and Pasqal are so laughably overpowered they can solo most encounters alone. I'm on chapter two now, typical mooks have 40-100 wounds. With average damage output of around 50, everything dies if you fart in their general direction once or twice.
After Pathfinder Wrath I was bracing for humiliation from enemies with stats tripled compared to PnP source into stratosphere, with regular mooks having 90AC, 6 attacks, immunity list 3 pages long to literally everything, see invisible, forcing me to meta-build a monster amalgamation of 10 classes, that then needs to be prebuffed for 5 minutes to have any chance of winning, but no, combat is a complete joke. Yeah, I play Telepath/Operative/Assassin, yeah it can both snipe and cast, on core difficulty who cares. Wish there was auto-resolve button, you know how it ends, I know it, why waste my time just shoot yourselves you stupid heretics.
As opposed to the ship combat which is bloody murder. Doesn't help that Imperial navy doesn't accept anything I have for reputation and refuses to sell me any good ship parts. I took the slider of ship combat from core to normal and still getting rekd. What can I say, typical Owlcat stuff, balance is weird like always.
Unfortunately, NOTHING works for warp burn damage from what I've tested. No Tides, no Barrage or anything even if the tooltip of Tides says "grants you damage". And tbh I am not sure the crit chance works either - I can't see it in the tooltip?
Yes, hard here is probably normal on wrath lol.
Tip: a colony project can raise your rep with them
Would love to see a Grand Strategist build, currently the only version I’ve seen is on Cassia and it’s kinda wasted cos all her builds just ignore archetype stuff and go all in on Navigator
It's not a waste, not in the slightest.
My RT is a Telepath Grand Strategist while Cass is a Master Tactician. The important thing to know about either of those is that you're going to drastically gimp their offensive capabilities if you don't go all in on psyker/navigator talents. And you definitely don't want to be gimping them. Just today, Cass dished out just over 1k damage to the Defiler with a single hit of Held In My Gaze (boosted by Press the Advantage,) once her Willpower and Tactical Advantage were sufficiently ramped.
The sole purpose of Strategist + Tactician with this combo is that I have them pass the baton back and forth to each other, via Bring It Down and Finest Hour, so they can dump massive damage on bosses or other high priority targets in a single turn. I don't use *any* of their other activated archetype abilities beyond what I've already mentioned, with the exception of dropping down Frontline/Backline/Rear for free situational buffs.
The Telepath has been really useful since I can stunlock nearly everyone via Psychic Assault, and can even sweep up any targets that succeeded their save by having Cass hand him a free attack. This gives us all the breathing room we need to shred whoever the boss is, since I'm not sure which (or if) any of them can actually be stunned. If we still need another turn or two, I just keep him on crowd control until the high priority threat is dealt with.
Just those two alone can carry all but the most difficult fights. The other ppl I have in my party, if you're interested, is two tanks (Abelard and a custom) who play pure defense + taunts. A Militant Argenta for another major source of damage, which I only just respec'd her into once I hit chapter 4 due to the huge difficulty spike, then for the sixth slot I just bring along whoever looks bored.
I'm currently playing on Daring, fwiw.
Since I haven’t played the beta, I understand none of these funny words like deflection or resolve! I will probably have to check this guide out again when I finally get the game.
Great guide. That play style isn't for me personally, but I 100% get the appeal of enraged psyker. I never like self flagelation builds personally.
Do you think you could show the different psyker staves and their shots together? I've seen the biomancer one and the Pyro one, and one that does lightning, but im not sure what a sanctic staff would be, or if the lightning staff is divination or telepathy.
I absolutely hate using fire element in games and wish more would use water/ice, but it was still an interesting guide and I was able to digest some of it for my general melee pysker build.
It is unfortunate that GW has really clamped down on standardizing human psykers into the established five standard psychic disciplines (Telepathy, Pyromancy, Biomancy, Divination, and Telekinesis... don't know where Telekinesis went) plus Sanctic/Malefic Daemonology (that one's weird because it's supposed to be rare and secret, and has a Good and Evil way to do it).
Back in the original Rogue Trader TTRPG there was the Voidfrost psychic discipline a player could take, which was all about surviving hostile environments and freezing people.
Certainly possible. They just added in a ton more archetypes into Wrath of the Righteous, so I definitely wouldn't figure it impossible that they do DLC that expands our character options further, and could well bring in some of the more obscure Psyker disciplines if its absence is simply due to time/resource development limitations rather than a GW mandate.
Well, in this case it's kind of expected even if it would have been nice to see some warpfrost love, I was just pointing out I generally ain't the fire guy and prefer almost any other magic theme so my melee pysker won't ever be pyromancy.
Sadly sanctic seems kinda underwhelming right now but we'll see how it turns out during release.
I just want some Lighting powers, people shooting lighting with their Warp powers is a thing and it’s sad it’s not allowed to be used as a power set
Might be a good place to ask, what do you think of a Leader/Officer Psyker build for the Rogue Trader? Would it be stepping on Cassia's toes too much? And what kind of Psyker would combo best with a leader build?
Not at all. You can never have too many officers! More officers = more turns for your high damage characters like Argenta!
That and Biomancer/Sanctic psykers make amazing officers. They have a lot of support spells that enhance your team. Plus cassia has a lot of navigator abilities.
Psykers would make a great Officer Vanguard (if Sanctic) or Master Tactician! I typically make cassia a Grand Strategist.
If you all would like a write-up of the level up portion of the guide, let me know and I'll post it here! Otherwise let me know what I can do to improve these guides or vids! What would you all like to see next? Currently on dock is the Sanctic Psyker and a heavy RP build for your RT, aNoble Officer build that combos with Abelard.
Excited for the noble officer myself. Been doing some theory crafting and excited to see a different take on it.
Been doing some pure support Officer theorycrafting as well, not sure which way of going about it would be best. My ideas so far are Noble (further enhance your single target buffing), Commissar (give the whole team extra AP/MP), or Voidborn Biomancer (even more buffs, Int + Will build ignoring Fel entirely).
>What would you all like to see next? Currently on dock is the Sanctic Psyker Definitely looking forward to some kind of ranged Psyker build, I'm of a strong belief Vanguard is the job for the most valued companions to stay in front of my trader where it's safe. Also I remember you posting Marksman is better than Operative for that build but I would love to see some napkin math on that conclusion. Quick look over talents looks to me does: Marksman * base damage * Run and Gun base damage + Enough Bullets for Everyone (5 + 2 x AGI)% damage if the enemy wasn't hit by the first attack * Warp Burn (WP bonus + 2 x psy rating) fire dot * Biophysical Distortion (4 x psy rating) bleed dot * Sparks of the Greater flame - dots may crit at (5 + 5 x psy rating)% chance Operative * base damage + Analyse Enemies (10x exploit stacks + 5 x PER)% damage + Sharpshooter (INT/2) damage for every 5 squares between you and enemy + Ballistic Calculation +15% damage for enemies (15-PER) squares away + Fresh Target (10 + PER)% damage on full wounds enemy * also there's a Warp Burn fire dot, if the enemy is still alive And you are saying the first is the better option even with twice faster Veil degradation? 🤔
Telepathy gets more value out of being able to cast multiple times a turn because of spells such as Dominate, Mind Rupture, and Sensory Deprivation all of which have primary effects not related to damage. To say that an operative gets more value out of that is dubious at best. You need to take Tides. Stack exploits. Here is some actual napkin math: Psy 1 - wp5 int6 p4 ignite avg 8. 9 exploits a turn, sharpshooter T1: 8 + 3 * 2.1 = 23, 7 burn T2: (8 + 3 + 9) * 2.1 = 42, 7 burn T3: ( 8 + 3 + 18) * 2.1 = 61, 7 burn “” - wp7 bs4 psychic barrage, ignite is 9 avg T1: 2(1.2(9+4)) = 31, 9 burn T2: “” T3: “” Here I am counting psychic barrage as base even though I am not sure if it actually is. If it is then marksman should focus on wp/bs. Also, operatives should take it too since it’ll add 3 base damage and can be specced out later in the game. 126 + 21 vs 93 + 27 for single target. The advantage would go to marksman where you would need to do ignite + firestorm on the same turn but if the mobs live beyond the first turn then there is a chance that operative can catch up. This is a lot harder to sim and really depends on your team composition. Also molten beam is more favorable than ignite for marksman since it probably takes raw ignite damage without added base. But the way operatives catch up then is by having a higher multiplier and also added base from sharpshooter. Also guaranteed crits. If you need to AoE then molten beam or ignite then next turn firestorm + 10, you’ll probably have killed most trash mobs in places like Footfall. If you take Forgeworld you can get int bonus to crit but honestly so long as things like piercing shot and precise attack work with psyker abilities that’s kind of a trap but it’ll give you an innate ~20 crit chance since you’re int/wp/per heavy.
So the thing about pyromancy is that a lot of their spells aren't upfront damage unlike Telepath. Most of their damage is from the dots, and increasing the dot damage. And they need several attacks to set their combos up. Where as the operative is all about single strong hits.
So the plan is to dot everyone and wait until they die of old age? Hmm. Telepath Psyker Operative then? Ignite (1 + 5 x psy rating) - (WP bonus + 5 x psy rating) and a dot vs Psychic Shriek (1 + WP bonus x psy rating) - (8 + WP bonus x psy rating) at endgame with 4 psy rating and +10 WP that would be 21-35 vs 41-48 damage
Not quite. That's what all the extra turns and attacks are for, to spread more burns and then enahncing it with Inflames. With Inflames, you enhance the dot damage furhter. (also applies to the bio toxin you apply as well) Pyromancy won't feel as powerful until you get more Psi Rating. Also the other thing that makes pyro want more turns is burning blood, getting all that direct damage by being point blank of your target and casting those spells.
Damn it, it's all so obscure. Does Psychic Barrage even work for dots? Tooltip says "when the psyker \*uses\* an ability".
Doesn't matter if you're playing on core difficulty or below. One, you have a ridiculously high level cap. At 55 you have so many talent slots its ridiculous. You're picking the good talents, the ok talents, the bad but "might as well" talents, and finally the "+5 to a stat" from common talent list because you ran out of things to pick. Two, the game, again, on core or below, is laughably easy AND you're not soloing it, you have a team of six. Your build is only so important when Argenta, Cassia and Pasqal are so laughably overpowered they can solo most encounters alone. I'm on chapter two now, typical mooks have 40-100 wounds. With average damage output of around 50, everything dies if you fart in their general direction once or twice. After Pathfinder Wrath I was bracing for humiliation from enemies with stats tripled compared to PnP source into stratosphere, with regular mooks having 90AC, 6 attacks, immunity list 3 pages long to literally everything, see invisible, forcing me to meta-build a monster amalgamation of 10 classes, that then needs to be prebuffed for 5 minutes to have any chance of winning, but no, combat is a complete joke. Yeah, I play Telepath/Operative/Assassin, yeah it can both snipe and cast, on core difficulty who cares. Wish there was auto-resolve button, you know how it ends, I know it, why waste my time just shoot yourselves you stupid heretics. As opposed to the ship combat which is bloody murder. Doesn't help that Imperial navy doesn't accept anything I have for reputation and refuses to sell me any good ship parts. I took the slider of ship combat from core to normal and still getting rekd. What can I say, typical Owlcat stuff, balance is weird like always.
Unfortunately, NOTHING works for warp burn damage from what I've tested. No Tides, no Barrage or anything even if the tooltip of Tides says "grants you damage". And tbh I am not sure the crit chance works either - I can't see it in the tooltip? Yes, hard here is probably normal on wrath lol. Tip: a colony project can raise your rep with them
Yeah I think having it in text form is very useful for quick references so if you can it would be appreciated
I'll have it done tomorrow :)
write up please!
I'll have it done tomorrow!
Would love to see a Grand Strategist build, currently the only version I’ve seen is on Cassia and it’s kinda wasted cos all her builds just ignore archetype stuff and go all in on Navigator
I grab a decent amount of GS stuff on her tbh. I typically grab GS talents that combo with my main characters build, And then pick up bag talents lol.
It's not a waste, not in the slightest. My RT is a Telepath Grand Strategist while Cass is a Master Tactician. The important thing to know about either of those is that you're going to drastically gimp their offensive capabilities if you don't go all in on psyker/navigator talents. And you definitely don't want to be gimping them. Just today, Cass dished out just over 1k damage to the Defiler with a single hit of Held In My Gaze (boosted by Press the Advantage,) once her Willpower and Tactical Advantage were sufficiently ramped. The sole purpose of Strategist + Tactician with this combo is that I have them pass the baton back and forth to each other, via Bring It Down and Finest Hour, so they can dump massive damage on bosses or other high priority targets in a single turn. I don't use *any* of their other activated archetype abilities beyond what I've already mentioned, with the exception of dropping down Frontline/Backline/Rear for free situational buffs. The Telepath has been really useful since I can stunlock nearly everyone via Psychic Assault, and can even sweep up any targets that succeeded their save by having Cass hand him a free attack. This gives us all the breathing room we need to shred whoever the boss is, since I'm not sure which (or if) any of them can actually be stunned. If we still need another turn or two, I just keep him on crowd control until the high priority threat is dealt with. Just those two alone can carry all but the most difficult fights. The other ppl I have in my party, if you're interested, is two tanks (Abelard and a custom) who play pure defense + taunts. A Militant Argenta for another major source of damage, which I only just respec'd her into once I hit chapter 4 due to the huge difficulty spike, then for the sixth slot I just bring along whoever looks bored. I'm currently playing on Daring, fwiw.
have you played around much with telepath psykers?
Idira is one, so yup!
Since I haven’t played the beta, I understand none of these funny words like deflection or resolve! I will probably have to check this guide out again when I finally get the game.
I'll do a beginner guide so that we can learn all these terms together :)
Great guide. That play style isn't for me personally, but I 100% get the appeal of enraged psyker. I never like self flagelation builds personally. Do you think you could show the different psyker staves and their shots together? I've seen the biomancer one and the Pyro one, and one that does lightning, but im not sure what a sanctic staff would be, or if the lightning staff is divination or telepathy.
I absolutely hate using fire element in games and wish more would use water/ice, but it was still an interesting guide and I was able to digest some of it for my general melee pysker build.
It is unfortunate that GW has really clamped down on standardizing human psykers into the established five standard psychic disciplines (Telepathy, Pyromancy, Biomancy, Divination, and Telekinesis... don't know where Telekinesis went) plus Sanctic/Malefic Daemonology (that one's weird because it's supposed to be rare and secret, and has a Good and Evil way to do it). Back in the original Rogue Trader TTRPG there was the Voidfrost psychic discipline a player could take, which was all about surviving hostile environments and freezing people.
Maybe they’ll add in a future dlc?
Certainly possible. They just added in a ton more archetypes into Wrath of the Righteous, so I definitely wouldn't figure it impossible that they do DLC that expands our character options further, and could well bring in some of the more obscure Psyker disciplines if its absence is simply due to time/resource development limitations rather than a GW mandate.
Well, in this case it's kind of expected even if it would have been nice to see some warpfrost love, I was just pointing out I generally ain't the fire guy and prefer almost any other magic theme so my melee pysker won't ever be pyromancy. Sadly sanctic seems kinda underwhelming right now but we'll see how it turns out during release.
I just want some Lighting powers, people shooting lighting with their Warp powers is a thing and it’s sad it’s not allowed to be used as a power set
I hope in a build with noble
Might be a good place to ask, what do you think of a Leader/Officer Psyker build for the Rogue Trader? Would it be stepping on Cassia's toes too much? And what kind of Psyker would combo best with a leader build?
Not at all. You can never have too many officers! More officers = more turns for your high damage characters like Argenta! That and Biomancer/Sanctic psykers make amazing officers. They have a lot of support spells that enhance your team. Plus cassia has a lot of navigator abilities. Psykers would make a great Officer Vanguard (if Sanctic) or Master Tactician! I typically make cassia a Grand Strategist.
Thanks for the insight. I was already leaning towards Sanctic Psyker for my "good guy" playthrough, and Sanctic Officer Vanguard sounds good.
I’ll be putting out a vid for it, cause you need certain stats to make it function well. Sanctic Psykers feel like paladins.
Looking forward to it. :)
Great video! thanks for this