Forgeworld to do Horus Heresy

It looks like Forge World are going to be doing several Imperial Armour books based on the Horus Heresy. Does anyone else feel that the Heresy is being flogged to death by Games Workshop? Quite frankly I don't see love that people seem to have for it.

The Heresy novel series has been running for about four years now and still we haven't got very far in the overall story. I fear that it'll be ten more years, give or take, before it wraps up. That is far too much. A dozen books should have covered it. In other words it should be done by now.

The game is set at the end of the 41st millennium, not ten thousand years ago. The Heresy is part of the background fluff and IMO it should remain there. Let's focus on the here and now please.

Report

I've had two 6th ed games this past week. One against My friend Jon and another against Muffin.

Jon:
Jon fielded an ork army in a standard kill point style mission. I haven't played against orcs since the eand of 4th edition so wasn't entire sure how the game would go. He didn't have an awful lot on the table (I had expected more if I'm honest) but I just couldn't stop that green horde from surging across the table. My dice had turned on me again and by the end of the game I had 0 victory points and Jon had something like 8 or 9. Good game but again shows how poor marines are against horde lists. We also had the awful corner deployment which didn't help me either. I'd have prefered either of the other two.

Muffin:
Having badgering me for a few weeks for a game I said yes and faced down his chaos marines. I was testing a possible new list for the 2013 league and it worked rather well. This game was a 4 objectives with that bloody irritating corner deployment again. I put both of my objectives close to my lines but for some reason so did Muffin, meaning that he had to cross the table to get them. My game and dice were on fire this time and I was hammering the foul traitor marines. Man of the match was really the Stormtalon which decimated two squads of marines and a rhino over three turns and taking no damage or HP loss what so ever. At the end of turn 4 Muffin conceeded the game with me on 10vp and he was on 1vp. That was a fun game but I think it was the unexpected arrival of my flyer that did it. I don't think he has played against them before and it kinda showed. Next time we'll see.

CSM update

Thanks to Faeit 212 for this update.

Chaos Space Marine Codex

As of July 25th, CSM book is set to release in September along with the starter (though not the same week).

General

Having not had an extensive amount of time with the rules, from what I have read so far, there seems to be a theme of if you want it, you can have it, but you have to pay.
Basic CSM squads actually end up cheaper than a tactical squad if they take only 2 special weapons and their aspiring champion has bp/ccw.
It's possible, however, to clear 400 points on a 10 man squad with a transport.
There does seem to be a ton of possible army lists that can be built out of it though, and that's really exciting, but at the end of the day they're just marines and nothing has jumped off the page as 'wtf...OP' (yet)

There are no CSM squads that can combat squad.

Does the codex promote a mixed army, or mono god armies?

You can get away with a mono-god list, but at that point you should be using cult troops most likely.
If you're adding havocs to your berzerker army, there's no real point in giving the havocs the mark of khorne for instance. In that sense you're varied.
It's not like 3.5 where we'll see thousand son troops with nurgle vehicles to min-max.
Undivided armies are a lot cheaper than cult marines. A lot. Playing undivided gives you many more bodies.

Marks

The only impact on Marks is that HQ models make corresponding cult units Troops.
You can mix/match Marks and Icons.
+1T/FnP isn't as good as a Plague Marine, they're worth their points.
HQ unlocks corresponding cult troop.

Marks are the same.

-Undivided still reroll morale tests?

-Khorne still Rage
-Tzeentch still +1 invuln save
-Nurgle still +1T
-Slaanesh still +1I

Marks are the same, except Khorne which is Rage, not +1 attack and has a point decrease.
Undivided Lords get Inspiring Presence command trait, and improved reserve manipulation.
Dedicated transports get the mark of the unit they're bought for, for free. Only units with the same mark can ride in it, (so be careful).

Undivided vehicles can transport anyone.

Other vehicles may buy them. An example would be the mark of khorne on a predator, which gives it a dozer blade at no additional cost, and allows it to roll d6 wounds on a unit it tank shocks

Yes icons prevent scatter

Marks are bought per squad

CSM/Havocs/Raptors/Chosen pay the same cost. Termies pay more.

Psychic Powers

There are 2 debuff spells in Nurgle and Slaanesh, 2 buff spells in Slaanesh.

Psychic powers are rolled, not bought specifically

Eye of Gods

The "eye of the Gods" table is actually several tables. First you roll to see what table you roll on, then you roll what you get after winning a challenge, killing a monstrous creature or walker, or annihilating a unit in close combat.

One of the tables is Daemonic Gifts.
The chart is 6 charts of 6 options.

Units (General)

CSM and Cultists are Troops

Cult units become troops with the right mark on your warlord.
No bonuses for Sacred numbers
No one comes with icons by default, cult troops get marks by default.

Khorne

Skull Champions can take collars that give the squad and any vehicle it's embarked in a 5+ DtW

Kharne strikes at initiative 5, and he gained armour bane which I guess is new. He's AP3, but for every model he kills (not wound inflicted) he makes an additional attack at initiative 1.

Not quite the same as warrior born as it doesn't keep growing, but it's very devastating for someone with 8 attacks on the charge.
Kharne has a 2+ Deny the witch
Kharne still hits friendly models.


khorne berserkers are AP 5
Berzerkers are 105+21/berzerker
berzerkers are 2 attacks, rage, furious charge, frag and krak grenades, bolt pistol / khornate weapon (ap5 in Close combat).
They're 5 attacks at str5 ap5 each on the charge.
They can also upgrade to have chainfists in the form of 2 handed chain-axes.

5-20 in size.

Noise Marines

Noise marines are overall a little bit cheaper. Sonic Blasters are 36" salvo now. Aspiring champions have access to a whip that prevents enemies from denying challenges. Other weapons are the same

Plague Marines

They are 120 for 5, + 24 for more.
Poisoned only in melee. Can throw their blight grenades to reduce enemy movement speed to 2d6 pick the highest, or if already rolling d6 for whatever reason (i.e. cover, charging) pick the lowest.
Plague marines are now poison in CC. Can throw blight grenades

Thousand Sons

Thousand Sons come with an Aspiring Sorcerer in their basic 5 before adding more Rubric marines.
150 points for 4 Rubric marines and 1 Aspiring Sorcerer, He gets a roll included..
Unit size 4-19. 20 points per Rubric. Still slow and purposeful, unless the sorcerer is alive then relentless.
Rubric marines are 1W, 4++
Thousand Son squads are rank 1
HQ sorcerer are rank 1, can be upgraded to 2.
Mark of Tzeench on an HQ is +1 (so you can upgrade all the way to rank 3)
There is a piece of wargear that lets you reroll up to your mastery in dice after you have rolled, but only each dice once.

Ahriman is mastery 4, can cast multiple powers per turn, gets access to almost all lores and has a default psychic attack much like smite but longer range that he can use in addition to his normal psychic powers per turn.

Characters

Most named characters are the same, but overall a point reduction. Abbadon is the same points and does not make terminators troops.

There are no new named characters.

I haven't read any special character adjusting the allies chart.

Abadon is AP2, Daemon Weapons are AP3

Daemon Prince

Kicks ass and takes names, but otherwise no army wide bonus's are granted

Daemon princes are jump if they have wings.

Chaos Space Marine

70 for 5, 14 for each additional marine.
Aspiring Champion is a 10 point upgrade.
Come with bolter/bp/ccw

For every 5 models in the squad you get a special weapon. If the squad is 10 or more, one model can exchange a flamer(5 pts) for a Heavy Bolter, meltagun(10 points) for an Autocannon or Missile Launcher or a plasmagun(15 points) for a Lascannon.

Marks range from 10-50 points, Icons range from 10-40 points.

Cultists

Cultists are 4 points each and come in squads of 10-30. They can have any combination of autoguns (str3 ap-) or auto pistol ccw (str 3 ap-)

They can take special weapons, but not heavy weapons.

They respond very well to dark apostles getting an extra benefit when one is in their unit.

Zombie cultists aren't scoring and cannot be joined by Characters (even with the mark of nurgle)

No traitor guard. Just cultists.

Cultists cannot platoon, but you can take up to 30 of them in the first place.

Terminators
Will Terminators be able to be given both marks and icons to essentially be cult terminators?

Yes, but it's expensive. Taking both increases the cost of the second and Terminators pay more in the first place.

Terminators pay 50% more for marks. Taking an icon if you already have a mark costs an extra 20 points

Possessed

Possessed get to buy (not roll) up to 3 boons from the Eye of Gods table.

Maulers (Elites)

str5/t5, 2+/5++, Once per turn can combination of 2:
power weapon, power fist, lightning claw

Each mauler chooses individually.

1-3. Maulers cannot deep strike, but are not slow and purposeful.

Dark Apostles

Yes daemons can be summoned to your CSM icons if you have a dark apostle.

War Smiths

war smiths who can restore hull points

Chaos Dragon (Fast Attack)

The only flyer in the codex
Dragon Takes out other flyers with a ranged attack
its 12/11/10 170pts
Fast Attack

the flyer you get is retardedly good at blowing up things that are zooming.

Bikes
Bikes get nothing new, just CSM on bikes with combi-bolters instead of bolters.

Raptors

Raptors still have access to special weapons, only the aspiring champion can take special melee weapons. They are reduced in points.

The Night Lord's raptors are a lot like vanguard (they cannot charge on deep strike though), but they have 2 attacks base + dual power weapons (ap3) with the shred special rule and are 35 points each.

Dreadnoughts

They can take marks

The mark of khorne for instance gives it Rage and a unique weapon option much-like blood talons except it's a giant rotary saw.

Obliterators (heavy Support)

Predators

No new turret options for predators.

New Siege Engine (heavy support)

The siege engine has a melta blast template.

Defilers

They're the same except they have the Daemon special rule, 4 hull points and a 5+ invulnerable save.

Havocs

Havocs, CSM and chosen squads can take autocannons

Vindicator

Daemonicly possessed vindicators I think will be in every list, with their ability to potentially regenerate destroyed weapons at start of the chaos player's turn

Vehicles

There is a sound-based vehicle upgrade but it's more of a Word Bearers item than Slaanesh.

There is a sonic upgrade for tanks, but it's not a noise-marine thing.

no chaos razorbacks, just combi-weapons

No drop pods

There is a new land raider, it's a lot like a crusader.
12 capacity for the basic, 16 capacity for the new one.

New Land Raider can ram fortifications and you can launch an assault on the occupants, except that you don't consolidate at the end, you remain locked in combat.
If the enemy unit flees they immediately exit the terrain. If the door is blocked (by your land raider for instance), they count as having been caught ala Sweeping Advance

Fortifications

There are no new fortifications but there is a unique upgrade to fortifications.

Misc.

Don't know about upgrades being finecast. I know that there is intent to upgrade the basic CSM box to support all the cult troops to be able to achieve any of the weapon combinations from the entries (including everyone having soundblasters).

Daemon Weapons are AP3 and pretty different now, you still wrestle with them. I think its a matter of preference.

The "Hatred: Space Marines" rule....is it ALL Space Marines (Chaos and Loyalist), just Loyalist, or just Vanilla?

Just imperial loyalist.

Chaos Daemons?

So... Chaos Daemons next then?

Forge World

There has been some discussion lately around our club about the possible inclusion of Forge World units in our campaigns and leagues. There are those who do not wish to see them made legal for various reasons and there are those who don't have a problem one way or the other, and then there are those players who see them as being just an extension of the codex units. Those latter players are trying to force the issue by saying that all FW units are now 40K legal. That's not true though. It also doesn't mean that anyone can just turn up with an FW unit in their army. Some opponents just will not play against them. I can understand why too.
Forge World makes some awesome models and expands the military forces of the forty-first millennium. However when it comes to balance and points costs, they are often way out and that is the problem. That and some armies don't get anything even remotely resembling a boost from FW. Forge World should just stick to making the resin models whilst GW should be adding their units, probably pointed and balanced, to the codexes. Then we would see them being properly balanced and people wouldn't complain.

All of this means that for the 2013 league (possibly map campaign) I need to decide how to handle Forge World units. At the moment we have a couple players who want to play the new Eldar Corsair army list and I have agreed pending them giving everyone else a chance to review it in advance of the campaign. As for everyone else I am pondering allowing each player three FW units that they can use but if an opponent doesn't want to face them, they can't use them in that game.

It's all so complicated and no one is going to walk away happy with whatever I decide to do.

WIP: Captain Democritus

With an afternoon to myself I've started work on the Sons of Tantalus chapter by painting my company captain. Here's where I am after about three hours. Still ngot plenty of work to do on him in areas but pleased where I am so far.

Musings

Earlier today my friend Matt posted this link to his blog. I thought I'd put my thoughts to some of it.

http://natfka.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/faeit-212-exclusive-40k-design-studio.html

Q1. What were the key objectives of 6th Edition?The ultimate goal of 6th edition according to Jervis was to tackle what both he and Matt described as ‘Associative and Disassociative’ rules and to add more realism to the game.

E.g. If a poisoned dagger had +1 WS in close combat, that would be deemed ‘dissacoiatve’ as it makes little sense. However, if it gave you a re-roll to wound, that would be ‘associative’ as it would capture the essence of a poisoned attack being made and potentially causing damage as a result of it being laced with some horrifying toxin.
Other examples of ‘associative’ rules included the abiltiy to throw grenades and the distinction between different power weapons. By making certain rules ‘associative’, the game adds more ‘weight’ to the feel of units on the table. Flyers crashing to the ground is another example of this, as is wound allocation in shooting (models vanishing from the front of units and not the back), Its all about realism.
Realism is a fine goal but not to the point where it causes issues. If you want a hardcore realistic wargame you wouldn't play Warhammer 40K. You'd go find Platoon Leader or something. Games designers should just follow the K.I.S.S. rule (Keep It Simple Stupid!). Sadly they never do.

Q4. Why Hull Points?
According to Matt Ward, vehicles in previous editions didn’t seem to fit very well with the rest of the game system and made for odd and peculiar situations. He mentioned that there was little granularity to the vehicle rules compared to other unit types. The addition of Hull Points is therefore used to make vehicles more inclusive during a game and give them a continued presence even after having taken a few direct hits. Jervis said that it flattened out the extremes. Vehicles used to get obliterated in turn one or take damage that would render them ineffective for a turn or two which really didn’t flow too well. Hull Points therefore allow players to enjoy the attributes of their expensive vehicles without them vanishing off the table having done virtually nothing.
The only reason that vehicles don't fit very well is because they are too easy to take down. I repeat myself a lot with this but for the points you pay for them they need more survivability. Hull points is not helping in this regard. Would have been better to leave vehicles as they were rather than screw them up like this.

Q6. Why allies and fortifications?
Jervis said that the old fluff in previous editions made many references to scenarios where different races forged alliances in various situations. He felt that later editions had polarised armies and made them rather restricted. They want to open up the game as a means to circumvent some of those restrictions and allow for more diverse tactics on the table. The fluff can now follow on and provide literature that encompasses those often tenuous alliances. Many alliances have obvious narrative value.
Makes sense. Just not when Matt Ward is writing them. The addition of allies to the game was a really good idea but could have been handled better. A lot of the possible combinations would just never happen at least not often enough to have been included.

In terms of fortifications, Jervis considered these beautiful plastic kits as somewhat wasted given their aesthetic value on the table. Giving these kits rules and points values feeds into the ‘associative’ aspect of 6th edition. I do agree here as I often wished for rules regarding the 5 massive quad guns in my terrain box!

It also puts cash in GW's pockets. But saying that, I also like it. Now we just need some non-Imperial terrain/fortifications.

Q7. How difficult was it to add flyer rules into the game?
Matt Ward picked this one up. He said that it was relatively simple given that flyers were an extension to the revised vehicle rules. The team said that they had an idea of the mechanic due to Apocalypse but held off until 6th to fully include them. Seems as though they had been toying with the idea in 5th but the rest of the rules didn’t allow for it too well.
Forge World already had decent Flyer rules. Why not just use theirs?

Q8. Why Challenges?
The team wanted to create the sense that characters were leading their troops into battle and not just skulking around at the back of units. It also gave lesser characters (i.e. SM sergeants) the opportunity to exhibit moments of heroics (leaping in to save their captain with one wound left from a rampaging Daemon Prince for example).

Space Marine sergeants exhibiting heroics just before being pummeled into the ground by a character ten times their point costs! Challenges should have been left out entirely or be only for named characters.

Some extra tidbits:
· The reason that charges are not allowed on Deep Strike is to prevent the utter predictability of mega-hard units appearing anywhere and destroying whatever they want every game. There was a possible hint about Genestealers being able to do this at some point in the future!
GW whatever you don't don't let Genestealers become the overpowered close combat option again. Tyranids are nicely balanced right now. Don't screw it up.

I spoke to Matt Ward in person after the seminar and I really must emphasise that he’s a really nice, polite and engaging fellow who doesn't deserve the flak he gets from some members of the community. He deserves praise for his role in bringing us 6th edition.

How much were you paid to say this? Seriously, Matt Ward should be kept away from anything 40K related. Back away from the game now.

He explained that rule setting is always going to be ‘a moving target’ and what works for one person is going to upset another. He said that there were many things that were out of his hands because business decisions have to be taken into account when developing game systems and rules.

Fair enough. It's always going to be a case of "someone is f***ing with my game". We can grumble all we want but editions change.

A couple of key points that came out of that conversation:

· Flak Missiles are currently unavailable to all armies, but we’ll soon see them filtering through into the game.

Or GW, you could have just added a line or two to each of the 6th ed FAQs giving them to missile lauchers for X points. Sorted.

· He spoke about Tyranids being a tad difficult to work with as they have (in the past) been a little one dimensional (i.e charge everyone into CC). He made a point about there being no vehicle rules in the Tyranid army and that its monsterous creatures need to be able to kill Daemon Princes so how do you balance it out? We shall see!

Charge into everything is what they do. Don't change that. As for MC's taking down Daemon Princes, well they can do anyway. Not as well as they used to but why should they get special treatment?

Next I spoke to Phil Kelly (the dude) who again is a really sound guy (and by the way - he isn't leaving GW).

Phil said that there are currently 6 ‘projects’ on the go for 40k. I think he was referring to Codex’s. I asked him about Tyranids too and he said (rather excitedly) that he has ‘some really great ideas up his sleeve’ for the Nids. Sounds encouraging! It's worth noting that everyone I spoke to in the design team understands the need for Nids to get a boost.
Tyranids don't need an update. Tau, Space Marines and Eldar do. Let's get them out of the way first please.

He also shared his personal opinion on 5th edition and said (with the greatest of respect) that Alessio Cavorte seemed to want to make the game more competitive and simplified. He thought that this made the game a little to flat and generic in its function (which I personally agreed with). His words were that it ‘lost its craziness’. 6th has therefore moved to address this and give more feel and character to the units and the game as a whole.

Cavorte did the right thing with 5th edition. Simple is the way to go. 5th was not a flat and generic game. It was the most fun version of the game we have had so far. 6th is a step in the wrong direction as far as I am concerned.
It does seem to be a consensus amongst GW staff that 2nd was a great edition in many ways (although obviously broken in others).

I think they were having a laugh. 2nd was the biggest pile of pants 40K has ever seen. The sooner people realise that and stop looking back with rose-tinted glasses the better.

One other exciting thing that he mentioned was the release of expansions. He said that one example of an idea floating around is the introduction of relic’s which could be (for example) wargear from the Horus Heresry era, usable in today's battles. Possibly a new book or expansion but still just an idea at the moment.

Interesting. Would have to see how it works though. Remember what I said about simple not complex.


Lastly I spoke to Robin Cruddace. I asked him about GW’s release schedule and to my utter amazement, he said that they were aiming for some sort of release each month. Be it a codex or some sort of expansion. I would be surprised if this were true!

He said that there would most likely need to be a larger number of expansions between now and 4 years time so that you don’t reach a point where all codex’s for 6th are released with 2 years still to go before the next cycle. Take that how you will

Oh dear. I can see this being a bad move. You don't need loads of expansions.