Ish

I’m wondering if we’ll see Apothecaries, Ancients, and Company Champions folded back into the Command Squad...?

The presumed it will remain a Lord of War... It probably will (and probably should) but we don’t know that it will.

This article doesn’t go into detail on how you “get those CP refunded,” instead teasing us that they’ll reveal it in a future update. On the other hand, we already know that the detachment with your Warlord in it gets its CP cost refunded, so a Imperial/Renegade Knight Faction army shouldn’t had any problems. This does look like it will make it cost you to play Mortarian / Magnus / Roboute... Which I am more than okay with. It’s a little annoying how “crutch” those characters became. Primarchs should be special, they shouldn’t pop up in every damn game.

All part of this balanced breakfast army list.

“The fact that gold exists makes every other colour equally inferior.” —The God-Emperor of Mankind Edit to add: I’ll add a black band around the lip of his base tomorrow, but I’m calling him “done.”

From Goonhammer, who said it better than I could: I can only hope all the missions in the book are half as well designed as the two we’ve seen.

GW has been teasing us with promises of multiple missions for each game size (500/1000/2000) and although I was excited by the idea, I was very skeptical. Even though this Incisive Attack is the only mission they’ve shown, I am now happily upgrading myself from “very skeptical” to “eagerly anticipating.” If they have truly coupled robust support for smaller game sizes with a balanced narrative campaign system, by Jove, it just might be the perfect casual league format.

Yeah, the problem with “flip it and move on” is that the other player can just flip it back... and Custodes really don’t have much shooting and don’t move terribly fast. I’m totally genuinely excited to play this mission though. It looks like it’s going to be the perfect combination of strategic mental puzzle as I try to come up with a list, tactical mental puzzle as I try to respond to my opponent’s actions during the game, and good old fashioned dice chuckin’ as the Random Number Gods decide to @&#% with us both.

With progressive scoring and four objectives, it’s gonna be hard to cover that with only two units and a hero. Although the mission description mentions that you can choose secondary objectives, so, potentially there’s something in there that would help even the odds... But, whatever, it looks like great fun!

Heck, the article actually teases that it’s possible to run KNIGHTS in Combat Patrol, so fitting the Glorious Banana Boys into it shouldn’t be too hard. Winning with them might be. Under their current point values and power levels, I can fit a Shield-Captain on foot and two three-man units of Custodian Guard into the Combat Patrol format (23 PL / 416 Points). Although these guys are going to be tough as nails, it will be extremely difficult to compete in the previewed Incisive Attack mission: But that’s kind of the nature of the beast when you opt to play an army were your basic grunt has stats to rival most other faction’s Special Characters.

Combat Patrol preview is up too. Missions and force organization charts specifically tailored to smaller format games of 500 Points. (Not coincidentally, I’m sure, each “half” of the Indomitus box fills out a Combat Patrol... and so do most of the Start Collecting boxes.)

The swirling psychic energy tornado thingy* around the Avatar of David Bowie Yncarne would probably look awesome in that chrome paint... Although I don’t think she really adds much synergy with a Wraithguard heavy army, at least not for the 300+ points she’ll probably cost next edition. * That’s the technical term, right?

Given that the international maritime trade is still reeling from Coronavirus (a third of the world’s total merchant fleet is Chinese flagged, more than half of all maritime trade passes through a Chinese port in any given year, and the vast majority of merchant seamen are Indonesian, Phillipino, Vietnamese, or Chinese) it is probably in GW’s best interest not too commit to a specific date too far in advance. Yes, GW does the bulk of their manufacturing in the UK these days (plus a small amount in the US) rather than in China... But GW still has to move their products via commercial shipping. Even shipping companies that only ply the Atlantic and never touch an Asian port are feeling knock on effects of SARS-COVID-2. The light of the Astronomicon grows dim, brothers. We must hold the line a little longer.

“Fish of Fury” was a thing once. I’m expecting it to come back.

I think that T’au Sept Tau will continue to rely on turtling up in a corner and trying to win by shooting their opponent off the table, since their Chapter Tactic Sept Tenet, Sept Stratagem, and Special Characters all lean into a (mostly) static gunline. The other T’au Septs will probably return to a more mobile form of game play, using Devilfish and Orcas to move quickly to grab midfield objectives (and then shoot their opponent off the table. I mean, they’re still Tau.) I think the question is going to be what, if any, changes happen for the Riptide and it’s support drones.

I iz da Prophet uv da Waaagh! Again!

I think Chapter Traits (or whatever they wind up calling them) will also be a big X Factor in the Reivers’ worth.

Hopefully both! Primaris Reivers and the entire Night Lords Legion need the boost.

I like the rule, it should stop Morale from being an all-or-nothing binary. Currently, you pretty much always ignore it or it wipes out your squad. This new system should increase that middle of the “bell curve,” where you’re probably never going to get completely wiped out but there’s always going to be a risk of a few extra losses. Combined with the changes to “Look Out, Sir!” making it harder to bubble wrap characters behind multiple small units and the new Blast rules being tough on hordes, we’ll probably see a return to 10-man squads... except from really beefy units that are meant to be aggressive elites and not bubble wrap (e.g., Aggressors, Crisis Suits) will still be useful in 3-man squads and really cheap chaffe where you don’t mind removing shovelfuls of them from the table after each blast (e.g., Boyz, ‘Gaunts, Conscripts) since you’re probably deploying them by the bucketful.

At present, I don’t own any Sisters of Silence and don’t plan to buy any soon. I’m taking a “wait and see” stance on them for now, until we know more about how important it will be to have psychic defenses in the new edition... ...and I’m kinda tempted to use Stormcast Sequitor models, with head- and weapon-swaps, instead of the Sisters of Silence models.

Wargame Exclusive sells a number of grimdark personal vehicles, including some very cool cultist limousines and inquisitorial sedans. I’d image most players would let you proxy them in for something like a Chimera...

I’m not sure if I like this or not. Combat Attrition Tests are gonna be a pain in the rump for large units of Orks, ‘Gaunts, and so forth.

They solved this problem, finally... Although it also seems like a complete “null deployment” is also a no go.

Ahh... the motte and bailey. Such an unsung hero of castle design.