The psychic phase is new to 7th edition and is a direct carry over from Warhammer Fantasy Battle. Seeing it is so new and how GW writes their rules the psychic phase can be very powerful - it can literally win games by buffing your army and debuffing your opponent's army. A new formation - Librarius Conclave - from the new Space Marine codex has thrown in a huge monkey wrench providing Space Marines with arguably the best psychic unit in the game. Space Marines also now have access to all the best psychic lores as well now.
Here is a list of what I consider to be the best of the psychic lores in no particular order (other than alphabetical):
Daemonology (Santic) *
Divination
Telepathy
* There's a caveat to choosing Daemonology (Santic) since you automatically peril anytime you cast any doubles if the psyker is not a Grey Knight... However the Librarius Conclave can successfully cast on a 2+ if there are three Librarians in the formation all within 12" of each other. So you can cast two dice for a spell requiring one warp charge and three dice for a spell requiring two warp charges thereby greatly mitigating the chance to peril for this lore.
If you read my first article I stated I typically cast six dice for a spell requiring two warp charges so you can see how much this formation helps you to conserve your warp charge so you can cast more psychic powers each turn plus greatly lessen the risk of suffering a peril.
Daemonology (Santic)
I'll delve into Daemonology (Santic) at a latter point in time - for now I'll just say it's very powerful with Hammerhand, Gate of Infinity, Sanctuary and Vortex of Doom. I'm not covering Malefic since I don't currently play any armies that can make use of this particular lore. Personally I'm glad to know eldar and Space Marines no longer have access to it.
Divination
The best spells are as follows - Foreboding, Misfortune (2), Perfect Timing, Precognition and Prescience (2).
Foreboding allows the psyker and unit to which he is attached shoot at full ballistic skill on Overwatch plus they gain Counter Attack. This is really good for my White Scars biker command squad since they have four grav guns... Which is a huge deterrent to any enemy unit that wants to assault them. As a side note remember grav guns are Concussive so if you should inflict any wounds those enemy models are dropped to an initiative of 1. Basically it makes the Death Star even more unkillable.
Misfortune requires two warp charges and is a malediction. It's really good for my White Scars as all those twin linked bolters are now rending versus the maledicted enemy unit. This is really good versus enemy fliers and FMC as my White Scars have no anti air. If nothing else it will force them to jink for a turn rendering their shooting next to worthless - which is really good versus Flyrants.
Perfect Timing allows the psyker and unit to which he is attached to ignore cover when shooting. This is another really good one combined with the White Scars command squad's grav guns - it kills thing dead !
Precognition allows the psyker to basically re roll everything and is really good for using him to tank wounds with a 3+ jink save or a 2+ armor save if you kit your Rune Priest with runic armor. Position the psyker such that the Chapter Master can Look Out Sir any wounds that aren't inflicting instant death to the precogged psyker. This is yet another psychic power that makes the Death Stsr even more unkillable.
Everybody knows what Presciencd does - the psyker and unit to which he is attached re roll to hit while both shooting and assaulting.
Force
I'll mention this one now since it seems most players seem to forget about it. You cast Force once then the psyker and unit to which he is attached are all affected - so you don't have to cast it individually for each psyker with a force weapon anymore. This obviously came from the Grey Knights 5th edition codex and is awesome... It works really well with the Librarius Conclave ! My preferred force weapon is the force axe for +1S and AP2. Force inflicts instant death thereby denying Feel No Pain. It's very powerful and only requires one warp charge... Really good versus any multi wound enemy model including monstrous creatures and gargantuan creatures as well - gargantuan creatures d3 wounds instead of instant death which can finish off Wraithknights.
Telepathy
Some people claim Telepathy ruined the game but I see it as a balancing factor versus ranged D weapons. Sure Invisibility is yet another thing that makes the Death Star nigh unkillable and with the Libarius Conclave it's going to be very hard to deny now. We all know just how good it is too. There are some other really good spells here as well such as Dominate, Psychic Shriek and Terrify. Terrify has excellent synergy with both Dominate and Psychic Shriek since all three work on enemy leadership and bypass Fearless. Dominate is great versus armies with low leadership such as Orks and Tyranids... It can literally shut down an enemy unit since if maledicted they must pass separate leadership tests to do anything. A nasty trick versus Tyranids is to dominate a Flyrant for the chance to prevent it from swooping. Psychic Shriek is great for removing a pesky objective secured enemy unit camped on an objective marker... One of the great things about witchfire in general is you can assault a different enemy unit - like I said in the opening the psychic phase is really off the hooks now so take full advantage of it.
The next article in this series will cover how to optimize denying the witch. If you're following along you've probably noticed these articles are geared towards armies I play but the basic strategy and tactical acumen can be applied to most other armies as well.
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