So, 40k has a LOT of named characters. Love 'em or hate 'em, they exist.

And something that bugs me is that, for a lot of them? They don't NEED unique datasheets. Well, they do for now, due to design decisions GW has made.

But I think it'd be much better if the majority of named characters were just (in-game) specific builds of generic characters, who should have plenty of customization for their datasheets.
Calgar shouldn't be the only Chapter Master with Twin Fists. He should be, on the tabletop, "Chapter Master (upgraded Captain) with Twin Fists and Relic Terminator Armour".
Caanok Var should be "Captain with Terminator Armor, Mastercrafted Power Maul, and Advanced Tactics".
Rotigus should just be a set of options for the general GUO datasheet.

I don't think this works for every single character-Primarchs (as much as they shouldn't BE on the tabletop to begin with!) shouldn't have a generic sheet.
That said, I firmly think 40k is better when it's YOUR characters. Not GW's.

 JNAProductions wrote:
So, 40k has a LOT of named characters. Love 'em or hate 'em, they exist.

And something that bugs me is that, for a lot of them? They don't NEED unique datasheets. Well, they do for now, due to design decisions GW has made.

But I think it'd be much better if the majority of named characters were just (in-game) specific builds of generic characters, who should have plenty of customization for their datasheets.
Calgar shouldn't be the only Chapter Master with Twin Fists. He should be, on the tabletop, "Chapter Master (upgraded Captain) with Twin Fists and Relic Terminator Armour".
Caanok Var should be "Captain with Terminator Armor, Mastercrafted Power Maul, and Advanced Tactics".
Rotigus should just be a set of options for the general GUO datasheet.

I don't think this works for every single character-Primarchs (as much as they shouldn't BE on the tabletop to begin with!) shouldn't have a generic sheet.
That said, I firmly think 40k is better when it's YOUR characters. Not GW's.

People already use Calgar in their DIY Chapters.
People already use Caanok Var in their DIY Chapters.
Rotigus gets better options because he's unique limiting those options to 1 and only one.

Edit to Add: Calgar is also both Unique and Faction Keyword limited to again allow for those unique statlines and bespoke rules. I haven't sat down and hammered it out, but I suspect mixing Calgar with Deathwing Dets and units could result in a fairly broken mashup.

Named characters have always had there own stat blocks/data sheets/or whatever term you want to use per edition. As well as their own bespoke special equipment.

There's no need to change after all these decades.

So if you want to use Calgars special rules/unique equipment? Then suck it up & play UM.
(What YOU call him, what color you paint him? Doesn't matter - your still playing UM...)
Same applies to any other named character.

I'm okay with their equipment being available on generic chars, but let them keep unique special rules and maybe also something special about their equipment. Like, give everyone the option for two fists, bit give Calgars' a pip of strength or what more.
Of course some chars carry something unique to them, so, give every DG char the option for the scythe, but only Typhus should carry the Destroyer Hive.

The problem here seems to be less that special characters are a thing, and more that GW has spent at least the last three edition stripping away the options to allow you to make your characters your characters (even if that means picking sub-optimal options that you like the flavour of).

I'm in the "Generic Characters Only" camp, though I know it will never happen.

ccs wrote:
Named characters have always had there own stat blocks/data sheets/or whatever term you want to use per edition. As well as their own bespoke special equipment.

There's no need to change after all these decades.

So if you want to use Calgars special rules/unique equipment? Then suck it up & play UM.
(What YOU call him, what color you paint him? Doesn't matter - your still playing UM...)
Same applies to any other named character.

Yeah.
I mean I realise this debate has run on for at least 15 years now, possibly all the way back to 2nd or something, but I'm not really seeing what the problem is.

I mean if you want to take Calgar, but don't want to take "Calgar", you can do a headswap or something and there you go. Or make a completely new model but use his rules. You can't translate him over to non-UM armies (unless your whole army can be UM, in which case again it doesn't matter), but I don't really mind that.

I don't really like it when certain integral faction abilities are locked behind a special character, to the point where that character is essentially 100% required in a vaguely sensible list.
At certain points almost every Thousand Sons army including Ahriman for example. I'm sure other examples would come to mind if I tried.
But really that's just a function of faction and unit rules design. You have seen the same where various enhancements have mandatory - or Warlord Traits/Relics before them.

I don't see what is gained by turning Ahriman into "A Sorcerer with [The Big Hat]+[Staff of Zappy] with [Magic Missiles+1]" that are options any generic sorcerer could take for the same points.

Tyel wrote:

I don't see what is gained by turning Ahriman into "A Sorcerer with [The Big Hat]+[Staff of Zappy] with [Magic Missiles+1]" that are options any generic sorcerer could take for the same points.

What's gained is that if GW's writer wants his super-special-favourite-best-character to have really cool rules and wargear then he has to make those things available to generic characters as well.

Thus we might get something resembling actual options for generic characters.

I liked it in 5th edition where the SM codex encouraged you to file the names off and kitbash your own for your custom chapter. A lot of them let you tweak your chapter rules, which they mostly do with detachments these days.

I understand that having more options, especially when layered with special unit rules, can cause some issues. But generally I’m in favor of more choices that let you customize your dudes.

This is why I'm looking forward to the maelstrom book and a design your own character bit.


I wish Special Characters existed for Crusade and other Narrative based games only.

Your own dudes should be the stars of regular games of 40k.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
This is why I'm looking forward to the maelstrom book and a design your own character bit.


I wish Special Characters existed for Crusade and other Narrative based games only.

Your own dudes should be the stars of regular games of 40k.

Ironic that in Crusade, the more narrative game style, while you can use special characters, you are incentivized not to. They don’t gain XP or battle honors

I’d love to have the Anvil of Apotheosis stuff from AoS move to 40k. But getting the balance right would be rough.

 vipoid wrote:

Tyel wrote:

I don't see what is gained by turning Ahriman into "A Sorcerer with [The Big Hat]+[Staff of Zappy] with [Magic Missiles+1]" that are options any generic sorcerer could take for the same points.

What's gained is that if GW's writer wants his super-special-favourite-best-character to have really cool rules and wargear then he has to make those things available to generic characters as well.

Thus we might get something resembling actual options for generic characters.

Yeah. For me, the bigger side of the issue is not "Named characters are unique," it's "Generic characters lack options."
But the issues are at least somewhat related.

The biggest issue I have with special characters is when they become auto-takes. When every Guard list has Gaunt's Ghosts, or every World Eaters list has Angron, or every Ultramarines list has Titus/Calgar/Ventris/etc, that's when I think things need a serious shakeup.

Unfortunately, GW doesn't want to do that, and would rather have people take self-limiting unique models that they don't need to worry about people spamming.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah. For me, the bigger side of the issue is not "Named characters are unique," it's "Generic characters lack options."
But the issues are at least somewhat related.

Agreed.

I think the loss of artefact weapons and the like has been a particularly heavy blow in this regard because a lot of the time you end up with a lot of weapons being bad/mediocre, except that special characters get to have actually good versions of said weapons.

To take a random example, the Necron Staff of Light is a rather mediocre weapon for HQs with S5 AP-2 D1 or 3 shots with the same profile. However, in 9th there were some upgraded versions of this - including one with +1 across the board (i.e. S6 AP-3 D2, 4 shots at range). So if you wanted a decent hybrid lord, you could actually get a decent weapon.

Now though, all those variants are gone and only Imotekh is allowed to have an actually good version of the weapon.

Just a random example but it hopefully illustrates the frustration of wargear options being stripped from generic lords while special characters get to keep all their toys.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
The biggest issue I have with special characters is when they become auto-takes. When every Guard list has Gaunt's Ghosts, or every World Eaters list has Angron, or every Ultramarines list has Titus/Calgar/Ventris/etc, that's when I think things need a serious shakeup.

Unfortunately, GW doesn't want to do that, and would rather have people take self-limiting unique models that they don't need to worry about people spamming.

I think this is also an issue and one made worse when special characters have no generic equivalent at all.

Not ALL characters need to be generic, but I feel that for the most part, named characters should be showcases of 'look at the cool stuff we can do with these character builder rules we have provided'. Like a nice big list of equipment upgrades, stat upgrades, special abilities, and FOC swaps that you can then pick and chose from. Like a Guard Commander with Carapace Armor, a Hellgun, Deep Strike and who say lets you take 1 unit of Stormtroopers as Troops. Or for example a Commissar who takes a laspistol and chainsword, upgrades their Leadership and Weapon Skill, and takes an attendant with a Meltagun. You need some rails to keep you from making the most overpowered character ever (though then again, points costs can probably cover some of that), but overall a nice big list of options to pick and choose from to build 'your dudes' is just fun.

The problem I have with special characters is that their very creation then commits the setting to bend around them, money to be invested into models and fiction and the introduction of comic book death rules that cheapen the game.

If gw made them and killed them an edition later I'd not have an issue. But having Skeletor survive 40 years cackling and shaking his first in a setting that tries to style itself as a merciless meatgrinder is just lame.

And because they have now committed resources they have to sell the models so then they have to give them all bespoke uber rules making them more popular and reinforcing their existence in the setting.


Imo, they should be giving each version of character models their own name and leave it at that. All those lieutenants can be characters but the name is all thats different.

It justifies why there are so many versions of the same character entry.

But continually spitting out new uber characters that have bespoke rules to sell them, no only takes away from options for the army, it competes with generic versions of the same unit.

Ragnar, Calgar, Dante, asmodai are all just names for ranks of space marines. Every marine captain is about equivalent in combat prowess, but the named ones skew the perception terribly.

This is also true of factions where people see fiction protagonists as if the whole faction are that capable. Malum cado represents 40k plot armour, not standard marine capability.

Long-winded, nuanced (read: overly-complicated) take incoming:

So first of all, I do enjoy named characters existing. However, I think the vast majority of named characters don't deserve to have their own datasheets and should just be generic datasheets/builds. To my mind, something deserving to be a named character should basically boil down to them being an example of something so unique/rare within the galaxy that you wouldn't reasonably have multiple things with similar rules on the same battlefield 99.9% of the time. So maybe "named character" is a bit of a misnomer. What I really want is a 0-1 limit for certain datasheets to help convey how rare and unusual they are.

So Roboute Guilliman? He's one of a kind. It would be weird to have multiple things on the table with his stats and abilities. Give that guy a 0-1 limit.

Marneus Calgar? As far as I'm aware, he's basically just a generic chapter master with two power fists and two storm bolters. He doesn't need super special bespoke +1 strength power fists that are somehow extra special because the guy who made them was just really on his game that day. He can just use the rules of a generic chapter master. He isn't actually that special. If you don't want to field him unless his fists have an extra pip of strength or whatever, then you never really liked him for the model or lore in the first place; you were just optimizing your list.

Avatar of Khaine? It's a weird day when you have several of those in the same place at the same time. Give them a 0-1 limit.

Eldrad? He could reasonably just be a generic farseer with the option to swap out Guide for Doom and Eldritch Storm for Mind War.

Jain Zar? That's a trickier one. You could maybe make the case that generic exarch characters should exist and that most of a phoenix lord's gimmick could be covered by wargear/exarch power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that phoenix lords should be a cut above even an exarch and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented.

So basically:
* 0-1 datasheets should exist.
* Most named characters aren't special enough to be 0-1 and should be turned into generic datasheet options.
* Some non-characters should also probably become 0-1 units either for balance reasons or to simply reflect their fluff. Aren't there only supposed to be a few riptides in the galaxy? Maybe make those guys 0-1.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

Tyel wrote:

I don't see what is gained by turning Ahriman into "A Sorcerer with [The Big Hat]+[Staff of Zappy] with [Magic Missiles+1]" that are options any generic sorcerer could take for the same points.

What's gained is that if GW's writer wants his super-special-favourite-best-character to have really cool rules and wargear then he has to make those things available to generic characters as well.

Thus we might get something resembling actual options for generic characters.

Yeah. For me, the bigger side of the issue is not "Named characters are unique," it's "Generic characters lack options."
But the issues are at least somewhat related.

Even if they did this though, generic characters would still lack options. They'd have to log the equipment and the bespoke together, so you're still making Calgar out of a generic Terminator Captain. What I think you want are generic characters with generic equipment and rules that use the special characters as templates.

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

Tyel wrote:

I don't see what is gained by turning Ahriman into "A Sorcerer with [The Big Hat]+[Staff of Zappy] with [Magic Missiles+1]" that are options any generic sorcerer could take for the same points.

What's gained is that if GW's writer wants his super-special-favourite-best-character to have really cool rules and wargear then he has to make those things available to generic characters as well.

Thus we might get something resembling actual options for generic characters.

Yeah. For me, the bigger side of the issue is not "Named characters are unique," it's "Generic characters lack options."
But the issues are at least somewhat related.

Even if they did this though, generic characters would still lack options. They'd have to log the equipment and the bespoke together, so you're still making Calgar out of a generic Terminator Captain. What I think you want are generic characters with generic equipment and rules that use the special characters as templates.

What I want is for units (especially characters, but really most units) to have customization.
And, as part of that, most Named Characters should simply be able to be built from the generic options.

Calgar doesn't need +2 Strength or +1 Damage on his Powerfists over any other Chapter Master.
I don't have to take Rotigus to get a +1 Damage ability on a GUO-though if that ability would be too strong to have in multiples, I'm totally fine making that option max at 1 per army.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Marneus Calgar? As far as I'm aware, he's basically just a generic chapter master with two power fists and two storm bolters. He doesn't need super special bespoke +1 strength power fists that are somehow extra special because the guy who made them was just really on his game that day. He can just use the rules of a generic chapter master. He isn't actually that special. If you don't want to field him unless his fists have an extra pip of strength or whatever, then you never really liked him for the model or lore in the first place; you were just optimizing your list.

His Super Fists are "unique" and the fist parts are nice, and yeah math wise more attacks, more AP, and More D - but you're speeding right past the part that sticks out to me. They're a LOT more than a storm bolter. 18" A4 D2 pistol The Gauntlets are a HUGE increase not just "one more pip of strength" I can think of only one (maybe two depending on how technical you want to get) places his gauntlets aren't an upgrade over generic.

Jain Zar? That's a trickier one. You could maybe make the case that generic exarch characters should exist and that most of a phoenix lord's gimmick could be covered by wargear/exarch power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that phoenix lords should be a cut above even an exarch and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented.

I'm not sure why Jain Zar is Epic Hero Unique and Marneus Calgar is not. Theres only one of both in the entire universe. You could maybe make the case that generic captain characters should exist and that most of the Chapter Master's gimmick could be covered by wargear/Chapter Master power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that Chapter Masters should be a cut above even a Captain, and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented. See how easy that worked?

I think one of the problems is that the Epic Heroes are the theme enabler for themes that are not directly related to the character. Calgar is THE road to Tactical Doctrine. And I get it that Ultramarines are THE Tactical Doctrine Chapter so that should be their thing. But it shouldn't be run through Calgar and only Calgar. Compare and Contrast that to several editions ago when using Sammael made all the BIKE units BATTLELINE (so to speak) and Belial made all TERMINATORS BATTLELINE (and OC2). That was a bespoke that was directly related to taking Belial and Sammael for a non-standard theme. You can argue all TERMINATOR CAPTAINs should have had the same bespoke and you'd probably be right, but the example does pretty effectively show what I mean by directly related to the character. Making Terminators troops wouldn't have made (enough) sense if it came from Azrael. Or even Terminator Calgar.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:

Calgar doesn't need +2 Strength or +1 Damage on his Powerfists over any other Chapter Master.
I don't have to take Rotigus to get a +1 Damage ability on a GUO-though if that ability would be too strong to have in multiples, I'm totally fine making that option max at 1 per army.

Why not? That's the "options" that were taken. And he actually doesn't have more stat over the other Chapter Masters and Captains. His fists are very comparable to Agatone's Thunderhammer. Adrax gets 2 more S, Calgar gets 1 more AP and Calgar gets 1 more A for being a Chapter Master instead of a Captain. Lysander's Thunder hammer is 2 more S, and the same AP. again with 1 more A for Chapter Master. Pedro Kantor is a Chapter master and his Fist of Dorn but instead of getting +1 A his Dorn's Arrow shooting is RF2 +1S and Sustained Hits instead of A4 and Pistol. Suboden Khan has a spear with the same A, 2 less Strength, 1 less AP and D, but Lance (which regrants some S) and Anti-Monster 4+ and Anti-Vehicle 4+ making the S almost unimportant. Then for shooting he has an Onslaught Gatling Cannon. Caanok Var's Tetsubo has generic Captain with Power Fist stats. And an entire second "Sweep" stat line. Plus his bespoke. Iron Father Feiros has Chapter Master 6A, and 1 less S, AP and D. He also has a second EXTRA ATTACKS weapon that that provides two more S8 -2 D3 attacks which more or less equals out with Calgar. Tor Garadon's fists are absolutely hillarious. Captain 5A, S+4 AP down 1, Damage down 1. Unless you're punching a Monster Vehicle or Fortification in wich case its +6S 1 more AP, and 1 more D. Tor Garadon is - as far as I know - the only SM Captain/Chapter Master who can single handedly melee a Great Unclean One to death in a single fight phase. Everyone else (Captains and Chapter Masters with Fists/Hammers/equivalent as opposed to power/chain -swords, maces and the like) is pretty evenly equipped except Garadon. And Pedro needs to get +1A on his fist which I'm guessing was lost in the edition update.

I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

Marneus calgars first character entry in 2nd ed had him literally equipped with 2 power fists and a storm bolter.

The fact he could wield a storm bolter while wearing 2 power fists WAS his uniqueness.

Gw insisting on bespoke rules and weapon profiles for every army and unit infected characters.

Ragnar in 3rd ed just carried a frost blade that any character could have. Now he has a ridiculous profile for the weapon.

Thaka used to have a power klaw and big shoots. Now they're both insane


The point is that their weapons weren't always uber snowflake profiles and they don't have to remain so. A power fist is a power fist. A frost blade a frost blade.

These silly stats are part and parcel of the current shift to OTT characters with overly unique weapons and stats in order to sell unique versions of existing character types.

Putting a name on a colonel or a marine captain doesn't make them any different from any other colonels or captains.

EVERY CHARACTER IN 40K HAS A NAME. Even the 'generic' ones you use in your game.

There is no such thing as a vanilla exarch, captain, shas o, warboss etc. they are all characters in the setting. Or do people think when they deploy captain with powerfist he's literally representing a non existent person in 40k without a name?

I always thought the point of named characters was to give an example of what you could do yourself, originally. And to sort of showcase the themes of the factions with a bit of fun fiction and flavourful rules.

I think they originally expected that people would just make their own and also come up with some flavourful rules if they wanted to to represent their experiences on the battlefield, playing narrative style games with the same characters recurring.

The game has definitely morphed into something else now, and that style of play is not as prominent (though I do hear Crusade is representing it in a modern way). The role of those characters has changed - now they are part of the brand identity of the setting, protagonists of an ongoing story and products that command an extra high price tag.

I think the tendency to think your OC was super cool and want to show them off was always there, and I honestly think the Pheonix Lords were an example of this and one of the earliest ones. The way they were written so that they persisted after death in the armour and could therefore show up really anywhere made them a weird cross over from "here's a cool example character" to "this could be one of your dudes".

It's pretty offputting to me, I think in my entire time playing Warhammer I only ever used Commander Tycho once or twice back in the 90s and then decided I preferred my own characters and never used any specials ever again. But it's been a long time since that original "make your own dudes, here's a fun example" style was the main focus.

Edit: It's very similar in a way to adventures for D&D - originally they didn't sell them because they thought the whole point was to make your own, so who'd want to buy premade ones? They only put the adventures in the starter set as an example of the kind of thing you could do, and how to structure it. Originally some of the early starter adventures even explicitly had blank spaces where you were guided into how to stock rooms with treasure and monsters. But now a lot of D&D is playing pre-written adventures, often entire pre-written campaigns and "adventure paths" where the entire thing is a product you consume rather than something you create for yourself.

Named characters with inflated stats and powers should not be a thing in matched play.

All the characters miniature models should be playable under a generic name in the codex, and be stronger than the other HQ data sheets, but not the meat grinders they all seem to be.

Named characters should be buildable. As mentioned above the real problem is GW stripping units of options. Making super special named characters seems to be mostly a business decision of wanting to sell models, or a sort of comic-bookification of the lore to create an in universe superhero pantheon.

Re: Phoenix Lords. I don't quite remember if the 2nd ed Phoenix Lords were much more powerful than the Exarchs you could build at the time. You could make very dangerous custom Exarchs, and I think the special abilities of the Phoenix Lords were just combos of Wargear and generic Exarch Powers.

2nd ed also had a set of custom Chapter Master rules too, which included a few "generic" skills you could amp them up with, iirc.

 Hellebore wrote:
Marneus calgars first character entry in 2nd ed had him literally equipped with 2 power fists and a storm bolter.

The fact he could wield a storm bolter while wearing 2 power fists WAS his uniqueness.

Gw insisting on bespoke rules and weapon profiles for every army and unit infected characters.

Ragnar in 3rd ed just carried a frost blade that any character could have. Now he has a ridiculous profile for the weapon.

Thaka used to have a power klaw and big shoots. Now they're both insane


The point is that their weapons weren't always uber snowflake profiles and they don't have to remain so. A power fist is a power fist. A frost blade a frost blade.

Just to add to this point - prior editions had both standard wargear and also artefacts, which were 1/army to represent their rarity. These included (among other things) weapons that were essentially stronger versions of the standard wargear.

I guess the point I'm making is how special does a special character's wargear need to be, such that even special, 1/army weapons are wholly insufficient to represent their awesomeness?

ccs wrote:

There's no need to change after all these decades.

Funny how that principle is so malleable...

I agree with Wyldhunt, Calgar's "unique" equipment is just a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master. Originally he just had two powerfists with bolters in them. There's no theoretical reason why the chapter master of the Star Leopards can't have a relic called The Leopard Fists that do the same thing, nor for that matter is there any reason Calgar couldn't fight with a power sword or a meltagun (if for some reason he thought it was necessary).

 Flinty wrote:
I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

But only one named Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines. How many Exarchs are there?

Breton wrote:

 Flinty wrote:
I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

But only one named Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines. How many Exarchs are there?

How many Exarchs named Steve Angryfire of Biel Tan are there?

 Insectum7 wrote:
Named characters should be buildable. As mentioned above the real problem is GW stripping units of options. Making super special named characters seems to be mostly a business decision of wanting to sell models, or a sort of comic-bookification of the lore to create an in universe superhero pantheon.

Re: Phoenix Lords. I don't quite remember if the 2nd ed Phoenix Lords were much more powerful than the Exarchs you could build at the time. You could make very dangerous custom Exarchs, and I think the special abilities of the Phoenix Lords were just combos of Wargear and generic Exarch Powers.

2nd ed also had a set of custom Chapter Master rules too, which included a few "generic" skills you could amp them up with, iirc.

Not second, one of the mid editions let you customize your chapter, and 8th let you promote a Captain to a Chapter Master using CP.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
I agree with Wyldhunt, Calgar's "unique" equipment is just a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master. Originally he just had two powerfists with bolters in them. There's no theoretical reason why the chapter master of the Star Leopards can't have a relic called The Leopard Fists that do the same thing, nor for that matter is there any reason Calgar couldn't fight with a power sword or a meltagun (if for some reason he thought it was necessary).

And yet even when the Gauntlets were mechanically just two power fists with a storm bolter duct-taped to them, they were still not something available to any Tom, Dick or Harry, as they were a, a Wargear card with "Marneus Calgar Only" on them; and b, not a set of weapons a standard character could take.

Yes, they've been improved mechanically since then, but even when Marneus first appeared in Codex: Ultramarines, the Gauntlets were unique.

 Dysartes wrote:

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
I agree with Wyldhunt, Calgar's "unique" equipment is just a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master. Originally he just had two powerfists with bolters in them. There's no theoretical reason why the chapter master of the Star Leopards can't have a relic called The Leopard Fists that do the same thing, nor for that matter is there any reason Calgar couldn't fight with a power sword or a meltagun (if for some reason he thought it was necessary).

And yet even when the Gauntlets were mechanically just two power fists with a storm bolter duct-taped to them, they were still not something available to any Tom, Dick or Harry, as they were a, a Wargear card with "Marneus Calgar Only" on them; and b, not a set of weapons a standard character could take.

Yes, they've been improved mechanically since then, but even when Marneus first appeared in Codex: Ultramarines, the Gauntlets were unique.

And I find that something that should be changed.

Not to 'well.aktually' but the 2nd ed wargear card was not restricted to marneus, but to lord macragge, of which marneus was only the current incumbent.

2nd ed had suprisingly few named character restrictions on wargear cards they used, because originally the name characters were given as examples you could create, so you could use the equipment they had for your own character.

Obviously if you wanted to play Ultramarines from 1000 years before marneus, you could create your own character and call him lord macragge (in great 2nd ed writing tradition his unit entry didn't even call him that, rather master of the Ultramarines. You don't see the term Lord macragge referencing him until a few sentences into his description on the page...).

None of the Phoenix lord wargear was locked to them, so any character could use it - a solitaire in Jain zars mask for example...


The only item locked to a named Character in the angels of death codex was the inferno pistol, everything else was locked to a faction or rank within a faction. Same with codex space Wolves - for some reason njals staff was only for him, by the psyber Raven created specifically for him by an iron priest was not...


As all these weapons were artefacts of the army they were only currently carried by that named character but were carried by different people before and different people after.


It seems their attitude to this changed over the edition, as latter codexs like chaos and the guard had highly restricted wargear to named characters.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
I agree with Wyldhunt, Calgar's "unique" equipment is just a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master. Originally he just had two powerfists with bolters in them. There's no theoretical reason why the chapter master of the Star Leopards can't have a relic called The Leopard Fists that do the same thing, nor for that matter is there any reason Calgar couldn't fight with a power sword or a meltagun (if for some reason he thought it was necessary).

And yet even when the Gauntlets were mechanically just two power fists with a storm bolter duct-taped to them, they were still not something available to any Tom, Dick or Harry, as they were a, a Wargear card with "Marneus Calgar Only" on them; and b, not a set of weapons a standard character could take.

Yes, they've been improved mechanically since then, but even when Marneus first appeared in Codex: Ultramarines, the Gauntlets were unique.

And I find that something that should be changed.

The Gauntlets of Ultramar should remain unique. A Gravis Captain should be able to select Twin Boltstorm Gauntlets that gives him 5 Twin Linked Power Fist attacks and either 3 TL Pistol shots, or D6 TL Flamer shots. Lets switch to Sicarius for a minute: Every captain should be able to get a Pre-Heresy/Artisan/pick your name Plasma Pistol that doesn't overheat. Not every captain should be able to select HIS Talassarian Tempest Blade. Much of the sword stats are mixed with his "character" as a swordsman. The current design system is one that works very hard to prevent us from "permanently" modifying stat lines all game long. It used to be you picked a Captain with a Captain statline. And if you picked Terminator Armor they told you to deduct 1" of movement. Now they made a new Datasheet with all the armor and other stat mods built in. They still let us do a "For the rest of the phase add 1A" and similar stuff, but not the All Game Long things too often. If they allowed everyone to have a Talassarian Tempest Blade, they'd have to go back to having people mod their stat lines. And then they have to create two (sets of) profiles for all these unique weapons given to unique characters. Is the 6A for Calgar's power fists because he's a Chapter Master (I think so- Captain 5 +1 for Chapter Master) or a reflection of the Super Master Crafted nature of the Gauntlets? Is the extra Damage and Armor Pen a relflection of their quality, or Calgar's skill using them?

Long term, I'd like to go back to one Datasheet, and armor/armory choices with a better version of the 2nd Ed Wargear Cards or artifacts and such from the middle editions but again we're in an edition reacting to people demanding a dumbed down less "bloated" version of the game.

Ultramarines are, after all, well known for being the best hand-to-hand fighters. /s

 JNAProductions wrote:
Ultramarines are, after all, well known for being the best hand-to-hand fighters. /s

They're well known for being the Little Bit Of Everything Chapter. But I see you don't want to discuss the topic in good faith.

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Ultramarines are, after all, well known for being the best hand-to-hand fighters. /s

They're well known for being the Little Bit Of Everything Chapter. But I see you don't want to discuss the topic in good faith.

Why should Marneus Calgar be the best brawler?
Or Cato Sicarus be the best swordsman?

You're presupposing that the named characters are extra powerful relative to non-named characters. Why?

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Ultramarines are, after all, well known for being the best hand-to-hand fighters. /s

They're well known for being the Little Bit Of Everything Chapter. But I see you don't want to discuss the topic in good faith.

Why should Marneus Calgar be the best brawler?
Or Cato Sicarus be the best swordsman?

Show me where I said best? I'm looking at my posts and I don't see the word best.

I'm pretty sure the best swordsman out there is supposed to be Fulgrim.

Let me look:

Much of the sword stats are mixed with his "character" as a swordsman

Yeah, I didn't say the word best. I said his "character" was noted for swordsmanship. Rip Sewell is noted for the Eephus Pitch. Does that make him the BEST pitcher in the world? Like I said, you've made it obvious you don't want to discuss the topic in good faith.

Edit to add: I missed this part:

You're presupposing that the named characters are extra powerful relative to non-named characters. Why?

I'm not presupposing they are more powerful. This is yet another case of you lying about what I said because you don't want to discuss in good faith. There was one point where Chaplain Cassius was not only "weaker" than all the other named Chaplains, he was weaker than the generic chaplains.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Damocles wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Flinty wrote:
I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

But only one named Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines. How many Exarchs are there?

How many Exarchs named Steve Angryfire of Biel Tan are there?

You know you just remade my point? There's one and only one Marneus Calgar. There's one and only one Jain Zar. Marneus Calgar is not Chapter Master Steve Angryfire anymore than Jain Zar is Exarch Steve Angryfire.

I apologize for being overly critical.

But why should named characters (who, yes, can be noted for being exceptional sword fighters, or brawlers, or tacticians, or leaders, or...) automatically be better than generic ones?

Your earlier post said that a generic captain should be able to get 5 TL Powerfist attacks and 3 TL Bolt Pistol or 1d6 TL Flamer shots.
Why should Calgar have an extra attack with extra AP and extra damage?

 JNAProductions wrote:
I apologize for being overly critical.

But why should named characters (who, yes, can be noted for being exceptional sword fighters, or brawlers, or tacticians, or leaders, or...) automatically be better than generic ones?

Your earlier post said that a generic captain should be able to get 5 TL Powerfist attacks and 3 TL Bolt Pistol or 1d6 TL Flamer shots.
Why should Calgar have an extra attack with extra AP and extra damage?

I said that as part of the point about having to remove whatever Calgar stats are in the Gauntlets and what Gauntlet stats are indeed the Gauntlet stats. I do not have to strip Gauntlet Stats from giving a generic Captain the Aggressor weapon stats.

Let me check:

Is the 6A for Calgar's power fists because he's a Chapter Master (I think so- Captain 5 +1 for Chapter Master) or a reflection of the Super Master Crafted nature of the Gauntlets? Is the extra Damage and Armor Pen a relflection of their quality, or Calgar's skill using them?

Oh I see. I literally said I don't know how much of the Gauntlet profile is Calgar's Skill and how much is the Gauntlet's Quality. How long do you want to keep lying about what I said in an attempt to pretend you want to engage in good faith?

Do you think a general Captain be able to have 6 S8 AP-3 D3 TL attacks in melee, if they choose the appropriate options?
And 4 S4 AP-1 D2 TL Pistol shots?

I think it may also be worth mentioning that, broadly speaking, people aren't taking Calgar for his marginally better melee and ranged punch.

They're taking him because he can join units that normal Terminator/Gravis Captains can't (Victrix, Company Heroes), that he can generate Command Points in a way unlike any other generic Space Marine character, that he gets two bodyguard buddies if he's in Gravis armour, and gets to Advance and Charge which no generic Space Marine character gets to do without Stratagems.

As has been mentioned, it's not that he's a slightly beefier fighter, or has better wargear innately - that's not why he's taken for the most part. He's taken because he has very powerful datasheet abilities, which are nearly impossible for other characters to access. Remove those, and Calgar becomes much much less of an auto-take in Ultramarines lists. Who cares if his power fists are slightly better, they don't make him much more different to any other Gravis/Terminator Captain - it's the datasheet abilities which make him so much more valuable, and that's where the problem lies.

When special characters get abilities which are so valuable that they end up hinging entire builds around them, then you have a problem.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
I agree with Wyldhunt, Calgar's "unique" equipment is just a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master. Originally he just had two powerfists with bolters in them. There's no theoretical reason why the chapter master of the Star Leopards can't have a relic called The Leopard Fists that do the same thing, nor for that matter is there any reason Calgar couldn't fight with a power sword or a meltagun (if for some reason he thought it was necessary).

The Leopard Fists can. They use the Calgar Datasheet and UM rules. And Calgar had/does have a Power Sword. There's a Powersword on his model, and in previous editions when Powerfists struck last, he had the power sword on his datasheet for those times the controlling player didn't want to strike last.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Do you think a general Captain be able to have 6 S8 AP-3 D3 TL attacks in melee, if they choose the appropriate options?
And 4 S4 AP-1 D2 TL Pistol shots?

As should be obvious from the rest of my posts you've been dishonest about: No. I believe Captains - Generic or Named - get 5 Powerfist Level attacks. I believe Chapter Masters - Generic or named - get 6.

Let's look. (Again)

Why not? That's the "options" that were taken. And he actually doesn't have more stat over the other Chapter Masters and Captains. His fists are very comparable to Agatone's Thunderhammer. Adrax gets 2 more S, Calgar gets 1 more AP and Calgar gets 1 more A for being a Chapter Master instead of a Captain. Lysander's Thunder hammer is 2 more S, and the same AP. again with 1 more A for Chapter Master. Pedro Kantor is a Chapter master and his Fist of Dorn but instead of getting +1 A his Dorn's Arrow shooting is RF2 +1S and Sustained Hits instead of A4 and Pistol. Suboden Khan has a spear with the same A, 2 less Strength, 1 less AP and D, but Lance (which regrants some S) and Anti-Monster 4+ and Anti-Vehicle 4+ making the S almost unimportant. Then for shooting he has an Onslaught Gatling Cannon. Caanok Var's Tetsubo has generic Captain with Power Fist stats. And an entire second "Sweep" stat line. Plus his bespoke. Iron Father Feiros has Chapter Master 6A, and 1 less S, AP and D. He also has a second EXTRA ATTACKS weapon that that provides two more S8 -2 D3 attacks which more or less equals out with Calgar. Tor Garadon's fists are absolutely hillarious. Captain 5A, S+4 AP down 1, Damage down 1. Unless you're punching a Monster Vehicle or Fortification in wich case its +6S 1 more AP, and 1 more D. Tor Garadon is - as far as I know - the only SM Captain/Chapter Master who can single handedly melee a Great Unclean One to death in a single fight phase. Everyone else (Captains and Chapter Masters with Fists/Hammers/equivalent as opposed to power/chain -swords, maces and the like) is pretty evenly equipped except Garadon. And Pedro needs to get +1A on his fist which I'm guessing was lost in the edition update.
T

Here in the list of all the Power Fist equivalent named characters where I looked at their weapon statline to dispute your claim Calgar is alone in getting some sort of stat boost that other Captains and Chapter Masters don't - I specifically pointed out many of them are Captains thus 5 Attacks, and that Cantor needs to get bumped up 1A because he is a Chapter Master.

And Pedro needs to get +1A on his fist which I'm guessing was lost in the edition update.

Chapter Master should be an upgrade to the Captain datasheet.
And you're doing a lot of comparisons of Named Characters to other Named Characters, when they should be compared to generic Captains.

I'll also echo Smudge's post, and add to that that not every Captain should necessarily have 5 attacks with a Power Fist.
Let there be captains who have four S5 AP-2 D1 Power Weapon attacks, because they're better with their sniper ranged weapon.
Let there be captains who only carry a chainsword and a shield, but are tactical masterminds with rules to reflect it.
And sure, let there be captains who can mix it up with the best fighters, because they're also some of the best fighters.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Chapter Master should be an upgrade to the Captain datasheet.
And you're doing a lot of comparisons of Named Characters to other Named Characters, when they should be compared to generic Captains.

I'll also echo Smudge's post, and add to that that not every Captain should necessarily have 5 attacks with a Power Fist.
Let there be captains who have four S5 AP-2 D1 Power Weapon attacks, because they're better with their sniper ranged weapon.
Let there be captains who only carry a chainsword and a shield, but are tactical masterminds with rules to reflect it.
And sure, let there be captains who can mix it up with the best fighters, because they're also some of the best fighters.

You said Captains and Chapter Masters. The only Chaptermasters right now are Named.

And as +1A for Chapter Master over Captain IS an upgrade. Its the same upgrade you get from a Lieutenant to a Captain. And From a Terminator to a Lieutenant

Terminator: 3 Power Fist Attacks
Lieutenant: 4 Power Fist Attack
Captain: 5 Power Fists Attacks
Chapter Master 6 Power Fist Attacks

Edit to Add: My mistake, you said over any other Chapter Master.

Calgar doesn't need +2 Strength or +1 Damage on his Powerfists over any other Chapter Master.

Which - with Fist/Hammer tier weapons, is just Pedro. But I went ahead and included the captains to show you that he isn't the only one with Super Master Crafted stuff.

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Chapter Master should be an upgrade to the Captain datasheet.
And you're doing a lot of comparisons of Named Characters to other Named Characters, when they should be compared to generic Captains.

I'll also echo Smudge's post, and add to that that not every Captain should necessarily have 5 attacks with a Power Fist.
Let there be captains who have four S5 AP-2 D1 Power Weapon attacks, because they're better with their sniper ranged weapon.
Let there be captains who only carry a chainsword and a shield, but are tactical masterminds with rules to reflect it.
And sure, let there be captains who can mix it up with the best fighters, because they're also some of the best fighters.

You said Captains and Chapter Masters. The only Chaptermasters right now are Named.

And as +1A for Chapter Master over Captain IS an upgrade. Its the same upgrade you get from a Lieutenant to a Captain. And From a Terminator to a Lieutenant

Terminator: 3 Power Fist Attacks
Lieutenant: 4 Power Fist Attack
Captain: 5 Power Fists Attacks
Chapter Master 6 Power Fist Attacks

Yes, the only current datasheets for Chapter Masters are Named Characters.
That's an issue-you should be able to design your own.

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Chapter Master should be an upgrade to the Captain datasheet.
And you're doing a lot of comparisons of Named Characters to other Named Characters, when they should be compared to generic Captains.

I'll also echo Smudge's post, and add to that that not every Captain should necessarily have 5 attacks with a Power Fist.
Let there be captains who have four S5 AP-2 D1 Power Weapon attacks, because they're better with their sniper ranged weapon.
Let there be captains who only carry a chainsword and a shield, but are tactical masterminds with rules to reflect it.
And sure, let there be captains who can mix it up with the best fighters, because they're also some of the best fighters.

You said Captains and Chapter Masters. The only Chaptermasters right now are Named.

And as +1A for Chapter Master over Captain IS an upgrade. Its the same upgrade you get from a Lieutenant to a Captain. And From a Terminator to a Lieutenant

Terminator: 3 Power Fist Attacks
Lieutenant: 4 Power Fist Attack
Captain: 5 Power Fists Attacks
Chapter Master 6 Power Fist Attacks

Yes, the only current datasheets for Chapter Masters are Named Characters.
That's an issue-you should be able to design your own.

We were able to. In 9th. The options were very few, but we had them. Then people complained about bloat. So we got what we asked for. Well, we got what some of us asked for. This was also the same edition where you could build a character with the Soldier's Blade and other relics that STARTED to return to the 2nd Ed Wargear Cards. It was again a too small sample size. None of this has anything to do with incorrectly claiming Calgar gets more powerful weapons than any other Chapter Master (let alone the captains).

Breton wrote:
We were able to. In 9th. The options were very few, but we had them. Then people complained about bloat. So we got what we asked for. Well, we got what some of us asked for. This was also the same edition where you could build a character with the Soldier's Blade and other relics that STARTED to return to the 2nd Ed Wargear Cards. It was again a too small sample size. None of this has anything to do with incorrectly claiming Calgar gets more powerful weapons than any other Chapter Master (let alone the captains).

I bolded the big issue.

Wargear options were limited, and so was anything that would actually change how they functioned.
Captains had a RR1s to-hit Aura. Chapter Masters could select a unit in the Command Phase within 6" to RRAny hits until the next turn.

In an ideal (for me, at least) 40k, you'd be able to have a variety of uses.
All captains should be at least decent fighters, but some might push that to the extreme.
Others might focus on subterfuge and trickery, with rules to represent that.
Some might focus on leadership, directly aiding their soldiers rather than messing with opponents or being outright killy.

Imo named characters should only be represented by a fate rule that reflects their plot armour, rather than uber weapons and profiles. Some exceptions apply, where they are unique entities or supernaturally powered. Primarchs, daemon primarchs, phoenix lords, the silent king etc.

But where the character is just a named rank like autarchs or captains, they should be represented by that profile.

Lotr fate and might are about as unique as they need to be in comparison to their equally ranked fellows - ie prince yriel is an autarch and all autarchs are pretty equal. As are all chapter masters. Colonels and shas is.

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:
We were able to. In 9th. The options were very few, but we had them. Then people complained about bloat. So we got what we asked for. Well, we got what some of us asked for. This was also the same edition where you could build a character with the Soldier's Blade and other relics that STARTED to return to the 2nd Ed Wargear Cards. It was again a too small sample size. None of this has anything to do with incorrectly claiming Calgar gets more powerful weapons than any other Chapter Master (let alone the captains).

I bolded the big issue.

Wargear options were limited, and so was anything that would actually change how they functioned.
Captains had a RR1s to-hit Aura. Chapter Masters could select a unit in the Command Phase within 6" to RRAny hits until the next turn.

In an ideal (for me, at least) 40k, you'd be able to have a variety of uses.
All captains should be at least decent fighters, but some might push that to the extreme.
Others might focus on subterfuge and trickery, with rules to represent that.
Some might focus on leadership, directly aiding their soldiers rather than messing with opponents or being outright killy.

Again we sort of have that with Phobos Captains, and Gravis Captains and Terminator Captains and such, but a lot of the customization was lost because people didn't want "bloat". I want a huge number of enhancements. I want MOST of the enhancements from named characters to be in the pooI I want every character (or at least every character of certain categories If Veteran Sergeants come back as Characters they should not get a free Enhance - some chapters it might make sense for Aphothecaries or Techmarines but not all and Named Special Epic Hero Characters would have these enhance(s) chosen for them like they used to with Warlord Traits) to have an enhancement for "free". I want a huge number of "named" wargear (meaning stuff like Sunwrath Pistols, Foe Smiter, Heavenfall Blades, Blades of Burden, Maces of Redemption, and so on that one of each can be assigned to any generic character. Maybe more than one for stuff like the Sunwrath Pistol which was just the name for the Heresy No-Overheat Era Plasma Pistol. This should be done in such a way as to limit the wombo-combo stacking tendencies of the players. For example, the ability stack a Devastating Wound 8A Chainsword with Digital Weapons that let you crit on a 2+ shouldn't be a thing, and definitely not a common thing.

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Named characters should be buildable. As mentioned above the real problem is GW stripping units of options. Making super special named characters seems to be mostly a business decision of wanting to sell models, or a sort of comic-bookification of the lore to create an in universe superhero pantheon.

Re: Phoenix Lords. I don't quite remember if the 2nd ed Phoenix Lords were much more powerful than the Exarchs you could build at the time. You could make very dangerous custom Exarchs, and I think the special abilities of the Phoenix Lords were just combos of Wargear and generic Exarch Powers.

2nd ed also had a set of custom Chapter Master rules too, which included a few "generic" skills you could amp them up with, iirc.

Not second, one of the mid editions let you customize your chapter, and 8th let you promote a Captain to a Chapter Master using CP.

Yes 2nd. White Dwarf 209.

Breton is acting in a suspiciously trollish manner in this thread, but I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they're trying to have the conversation in good faith.

Flinty wrote:I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

Largely this. Without meaning to come across as just hating on marines (which is why I was sure to include Eldrad as a similar example in my earlier post), chapter masters aren't really inherently all that different from regular captains. They're basically just captains who were chosen to boss the other captains around. The difference between Logan Grimnar or Marneus and Bob the Chapter Master from Generic Chapter 777 is just that the guys with bespoke datasheets get more screentime than Bob. Presumably whoever succeeds Calgar as chapter master will also be a guy in chonky armor with hundreds of years of battle experience and access to the chapter armory.

Basically, Calgar isn't actually that special or unique. He's just the guy in charge of a faction that gets a lot of screentime. Him being the only guy with a pair of power fists and storm bolters isn't some character-defining piece of lore that shapes the personality of Ultramarines as a faction or him as a character; they're just, as Orkeosauras put it,

a post-hoc justification for giving him unique rules that are stronger than a generic chapter master.

And honestly, marines are kind of more guilty of this than most factions. Again, not trying to just gak on marines here, but Shrike probably shouldn't be the only captain who can figure out how to take his jump pack squad back into reserves. Dante and Logan have historically just been +1 versions of generic captains/chapter masters so that BA and SW players can feel superior to generic-brand marines (to help justify being convinced to buy an extra book.) So rather than pretending that Shrike is the only captain in the galaxy who figured out how to be good at flying/sneaking around, those could just be abilities available to generic datasheets. Instead of giving him super-duper double-ultra-plus-one lightning claws, you could just give him a pair of lightning claws. His lightning claws are lightning claws. They're not that special even if the blacksmith was having a good day when he made them.

Breton wrote:
I'm not sure why Jain Zar is Epic Hero Unique and Marneus Calgar is not. Theres only one of both in the entire universe. You could maybe make the case that generic captain characters should exist and that most of the Chapter Master's gimmick could be covered by wargear/Chapter Master power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that Chapter Masters should be a cut above even a Captain, and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented. See how easy that worked?

So my iffyness with phoenix lords was for a couple of main reasons.
1. Eldar haven't had the ability to take an exarch character since 2nd or 3rd edition. So giving aspects a character than can hang out with them to do the things characters usually do is sort of a niche in its own right. Autarchs have been able to kind of do this? But an autarch is a swiss army knife commander type whereas aspects tend to be beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't. Ex: Baharroth granting a squad hit & run back in the day or being the only way to let hawks drop grenades out of deepstrike now.
2. Phoenix lords are fundamentally different from exarchs in a way that chapter masters just aren't fundamentally different from captains. Chapter masters are basically just captains who get to boss other captains around. A phoenix lord is a demigod whose haunted armor can eat passers-bye to allow them to instantly resurrect.

So whether or not a phoenix lord warrants their own datasheet kind of depends on whether or not GW is leaning into the reanimating demigod thing in a given edition. Which is why I was on the fence about it in my post. Good faith question for you, Breton: do you see the difference?

I think one of the problems is that the Epic Heroes are the theme enabler for themes that are not directly related to the character. Calgar is THE road to Tactical Doctrine. And I get it that Ultramarines are THE Tactical Doctrine Chapter so that should be their thing. But it shouldn't be run through Calgar and only Calgar. Compare and Contrast that to several editions ago when using Sammael made all the BIKE units BATTLELINE (so to speak) and Belial made all TERMINATORS BATTLELINE (and OC2). That was a bespoke that was directly related to taking Belial and Sammael for a non-standard theme. You can argue all TERMINATOR CAPTAINs should have had the same bespoke and you'd probably be right...

Right. That's largely what I'm saying. You don't have to tie stuff like that to named characters. You can just make it a thing you can get from generic characters. Kind of like how bike captains made bikes troops in 5th edition (iirc).

but the example does pretty effectively show what I mean by directly related to the character. Making Terminators troops wouldn't have made (enough) sense if it came from Azrael. Or even Terminator Calgar.

Then it sounds like you would choose to not take the optional "make terminators troops" upgrade when you personally were fielding Azrael or Calgar.

Without putting words in your mouth, I get the impression you might be getting defensive because marines are involved, so we can move the discussion to other factions.

Urien Rakarth seldom warranted being a bespoke datasheet, in my opinion. He's basically just the most famous haemonculus, but he's not *that* unique beyond having died more often than most. The various special rules and gear he's had over the years could easily be generic options for other haemonculi.

Orikan the Diviner maybe warrants being his own datasheet because his whole "go super saiyan when the stars align" thing is supposed to be so rare that it would be really weird to have two crypteks pulling off the same trick on the same battlefield, even if you were reskinning him as Glorikan the Designer or whatever.

Shadowsun (cool as I think she is) is basically just a smart lady in a stealth suit. She could just be a generic stealth suit commander datasheet if they ever made one of those.

Farsight makes more sense as a bespoke datasheet because tau with surprisingly powerful melee weapons on their crisis suits aren't something you see every day.

Ahriman (whom I use often) could just be a generic sorcerer because at the end of the day, he's just slinging spells like everyone else.

Magnus is meant to have stats representing a being whose capabilities aren't really similar to anything else in the faction if not the galaxy. Give that guy a 0-1 datasheet.

tldr; most exist named characters aren't actually special enough to be 0-1. The like-generic-but-better weapons a lot of them wield are usually just an attempt to justify making them a different datasheet (and getting you to buy the model or the book they appear in) when the generic rules would be perfectly sufficient to represent them.

Iyanna Arienelle hasn't had rules since 3rd edition. She doesn't really need them. She's a spiritseer. A famous spiritseer with ties to the ynnari. But being famous doesn't mean she needs a +1 version of her staff or an extra special rule to show off how much better at spirit seer'ing she is than every other spirit seer in the galaxy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Hellebore wrote:
Imo named characters should only be represented by a fate rule that reflects their plot armour, rather than uber weapons and profiles. Some exceptions apply, where they are unique entities or supernaturally powered. Primarchs, daemon primarchs, phoenix lords, the silent king etc.

But where the character is just a named rank like autarchs or captains, they should be represented by that profile.

Lotr fate and might are about as unique as they need to be in comparison to their equally ranked fellows - ie prince yriel is an autarch and all autarchs are pretty equal. As are all chapter masters. Colonels and shas is.

Pretty much this. Iyanna doesn't need an Iyanna datasheet; she just needs a spirit seer datasheet.

And if you really want to dive into characters in general, autarchs, captains and colonels don't develop super natural resilience as they rank up. They're just as vulnerable as a line trooper. The difference between marneus calgar and a veteran tactical marine is basically one of education. Two Marines of equal age, one that went down the officer training path and one that stayed a non com. They have equal war experience, in fact the vet should have more boots on the ground experience and thus be a better fighter than Calgar.

But 40k is heroic so bigger hats equal bigger stats (I made that up), when in reality it wouldn't be that way at all, except for the supernatural characters like primarchs and phoenix lords that physically are powered differently.


I've often thought it would be interesting to have a game where you can buy champion upgrades and command upgrades to give to random models, to reflect that the 400 year old assault marine veteran is going to be the best melee combatant in the chapter while the captain is basically a tactical marine with extensive command and control abilities.

Breton wrote:

 Lord Damocles wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Flinty wrote:
I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

But only one named Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines. How many Exarchs are there?

How many Exarchs named Steve Angryfire of Biel Tan are there?

You know you just remade my point? There's one and only one Marneus Calgar. There's one and only one Jain Zar. Marneus Calgar is not Chapter Master Steve Angryfire anymore than Jain Zar is Exarch Steve Angryfire.

So how one and only one Marneus Calgar = super special named character rules, but one and only one Steve Angryfire = generic scrub?

Why does/should having a name necessarily equate to unique rules?

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zivixehm/bring-your-own-warlords-to-life-with-custom-character-rules-in-the-maelstrom-crucible-of-champions/

Seems relevant to this conversation. BYO named characters.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Breton is acting in a suspiciously trollish manner in this thread, but I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they're trying to have the conversation in good faith.
Disagreeing with you is not trollish. Trying to claim your special dudes are more deserveing of than someone else's special dudes is not good faith.

Breton wrote:
I'm not sure why Jain Zar is Epic Hero Unique and Marneus Calgar is not. Theres only one of both in the entire universe. You could maybe make the case that generic captain characters should exist and that most of the Chapter Master's gimmick could be covered by wargear/Chapter Master power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that Chapter Masters should be a cut above even a Captain, and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented. See how easy that worked?

So my iffyness with phoenix lords was for a couple of main reasons.
1. Eldar haven't had the ability to take an exarch character since 2nd or 3rd edition. So giving aspects a character than can hang out with them to do the things characters usually do is sort of a niche in its own right. Autarchs have been able to kind of do this? But an autarch is a swiss army knife commander type whereas aspects tend to be beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't. Ex: Baharroth granting a squad hit & run back in the day or being the only way to let hawks drop grenades out of deepstrike now.
2. Phoenix lords are fundamentally different from exarchs in a way that chapter masters just aren't fundamentally different from captains. Chapter masters are basically just captains who get to boss other captains around. A phoenix lord is a demigod whose haunted armor can eat passers-bye to allow them to instantly resurrect.

So whether or not a phoenix lord warrants their own datasheet kind of depends on whether or not GW is leaning into the reanimating demigod thing in a given edition. Which is why I was on the fence about it in my post. Good faith question for you, Breton: do you see the difference?

Good Faith answer? No. I took your own reasoning, replaced the special dudes you like with the special dudes you hate, and it was the same sentence only now the special dudes you hate were the special dudes to save and you called it trollish. I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different than Aspect Warriors, they're just Aspect Warriors turned into a character. Oh wait, you said Exarchs. I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different from Sergeants... I mean Exarchs in a way that Chapter Masters just aren't fundamentally different from Captains. Did you ask yourself why your own logic applied in the other direction was "trollish" but not when you used it? I mean if you really want to argue in good faith, what you're doing is an informal fallacy called special pleading. And its rather inaccurate too.

beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't.

A beatstick who modifies the unit it is leading. Like a Chapter Master who gives the unit he's leading the movement abilities to advance or fallback and still shoot and/or charge? Or gives them a +1 to Advance and Charge Rolls? Adding +1A and +1S to their fight weapons? Giving them Sustained Hits 1 and 1 CP per round that makes everyone use more Strats? FNP? Being able to Use Rapid Ingress and Heroic Intervention for Free and Repeat? I mean its not EXACTLY dropping Grenades from Deepstrike but every Chapter Master appears to allow the unit they're leading to do something they couldn't do without the leader. So that appears to be the same between Chapter Masters and Phoenix Lords. And nearly every leader unit everywhere. It appears Phoenix Lords are not fundamentally different than Captains either. Good Faith Question: You see where I'm coming from here, right?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Damocles wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Lord Damocles wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Flinty wrote:
I think Wyldhunt set out a reasonable distinction. Calgar is a chapter master. There are at least 1,000 of those, and they should all be roughly similar power level. There are only single digits of Phoenix Lords, and the lore is clear that each one is specialised to their own aspect. It doesn’t t make any sense in that regard to have a generic character sheet for Phoenix Lord, that you can choose a fixed set of options to build Jain Zar.

But only one named Marneus Calgar of the Ultramarines. How many Exarchs are there?

How many Exarchs named Steve Angryfire of Biel Tan are there?

You know you just remade my point? There's one and only one Marneus Calgar. There's one and only one Jain Zar. Marneus Calgar is not Chapter Master Steve Angryfire anymore than Jain Zar is Exarch Steve Angryfire.

So how one and only one Marneus Calgar = super special named character rules, but one and only one Steve Angryfire = generic scrub?

Why does/should having a name necessarily equate to unique rules?

Its not the name, its the rule(s) itself. EPIC HERO. And no I don't literally mean its an epic hero. I mean the rules for EPIC HERO - in the first place mean everyone needs to get some for balance - and for another says GW Made the guy, and they made the guy to be one and only one. Even if you could still make Chapter Master Steve Angryfire, he would not be an Epic Hero, and you can have three of him. But you can't have three of Calgar. That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

I want unique datasheets that do something niche, 10% overpriced to discourage their use. Once in a while you get a game against a unique datasheet doing cool thematic things. I dislike refluffing a character like counts as Marneus Calgar.

 Hellebore wrote:
And if you really want to dive into characters in general, autarchs, captains and colonels don't develop super natural resilience as they rank up. They're just as vulnerable as a line trooper. The difference between marneus calgar and a veteran tactical marine is basically one of education. Two Marines of equal age, one that went down the officer training path and one that stayed a non com. They have equal war experience, in fact the vet should have more boots on the ground experience and thus be a better fighter than Calgar.

But 40k is heroic so bigger hats equal bigger stats (I made that up), when in reality it wouldn't be that way at all, except for the supernatural characters like primarchs and phoenix lords that physically are powered differently.


I've often thought it would be interesting to have a game where you can buy champion upgrades and command upgrades to give to random models, to reflect that the 400 year old assault marine veteran is going to be the best melee combatant in the chapter while the captain is basically a tactical marine with extensive command and control abilities.

While generally correct there are holes here. Not all Captains would be Tactical Marines. Some would have been Assault Marines too. Some would have even been Devastator Marines. But they're not going to give a Captain a Lascannon with equivalent output to the melee power fist. Another is that there aren't that many Marines in the chapter (most of the time) that will have the same age as a Chapter Master. As you point out they're in combat all the time and thus die faster/sooner/younger because of it so there is SOME merit to them being older and wiser. But that would theoretically also come with physical deterioration. And on the other-other-other hand (as I realize I'm arguing both sides of this over and over) the wounds, and attacks and so forth are the same - I'm brain freezing on the word here.... But like in D&D when you level up and get a new round of hit points. You don't actually get stronger and tougher, you got wiser and craftier. Each hit point isnt a drop of blood, its the number of tricks and skills you have to avoid getting whomped on or to reduce the effect when you can't avoid it. Same here. A powerfist can crumple an armored tank (in the fluff which is sort of what we're talking about here). Dante can get hit by one 3 times. He's not three times tougher than a tank. He's just so experienced he can twist out of the way, deflect or other wise lessen the impact of getting punched in the face.

Breton, do you honestly not see the difference between a Chapter Master (an experienced Marine and the highest ranked of their Chapter, of which there are approximately 1,000) and a Phoenix Lord (the epitome and originators of the Aspect Shrines of the Eldar, of which there are about 10 total).

Like... I can name every single Phoenix Lord. I did have to Google it, but here you go:

-Asurmen
-Jain Zar
-Fuegan
-Maugan Ra
-Baharroth
-Karandras
-Lhykhis
-Irillyth [FW]
-Drastanta [Missing]

And then the one that's no longer a Phoenix Lord, Arhra.

Breton wrote:

Disagreeing with you is not trollish. Trying to claim your special dudes are more deserveing of than someone else's special dudes is not good faith.

Disagreeing with me isn't trollish, but your responses in this thread seem to largely be ignoring some very good points other posters have made. Combined with the combative voice of your posts, it comes across like you might be ragebaiting. Essentially communicating badly on purpose and being vaguely rude. If that wasn't your intention, great, but that's how you're coming across. At least to me.

Breton wrote:
I'm not sure why Jain Zar is Epic Hero Unique and Marneus Calgar is not. Theres only one of both in the entire universe. You could maybe make the case that generic captain characters should exist and that most of the Chapter Master's gimmick could be covered by wargear/Chapter Master power options, but there's plenty of reason to state that Chapter Masters should be a cut above even a Captain, and thus deserve to have their demigod plot armor and noticably better abilities represented. See how easy that worked?

So my iffyness with phoenix lords was for a couple of main reasons.
1. Eldar haven't had the ability to take an exarch character since 2nd or 3rd edition. So giving aspects a character than can hang out with them to do the things characters usually do is sort of a niche in its own right. Autarchs have been able to kind of do this? But an autarch is a swiss army knife commander type whereas aspects tend to be beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't. Ex: Baharroth granting a squad hit & run back in the day or being the only way to let hawks drop grenades out of deepstrike now.
2. Phoenix lords are fundamentally different from exarchs in a way that chapter masters just aren't fundamentally different from captains. Chapter masters are basically just captains who get to boss other captains around. A phoenix lord is a demigod whose haunted armor can eat passers-bye to allow them to instantly resurrect.

So whether or not a phoenix lord warrants their own datasheet kind of depends on whether or not GW is leaning into the reanimating demigod thing in a given edition. Which is why I was on the fence about it in my post. Good faith question for you, Breton: do you see the difference?

Good Faith answer? No. I took your own reasoning, replaced the special dudes you like with the special dudes you hate, and it was the same sentence only now the special dudes you hate were the special dudes to save and you called it trollish.

Right. In the text you quoted, I understood that you were rewriting my own sentence with marines in the place of phoenix lords, and then I proceeded to give reasons why I feel that the comparison doesn't hold up. I also pointed out that I'd included an eldar character (Eldrad) that I thought was unworthy of a bespoke datasheet and also provided several other examples of named characters (including ones that I use frequently) that also weren't deserving of bespoke datasheets.

Good Faith Question: You see where I'm coming from here, right?

I think I do, and it's unfortunately unflattering for you. Giving you the benefit of the doubt (that you aren't just rage baiting), it appears that you're failing to understand the points being made and to engage with them meaningfully. Instead, you appear to be intent on lacing your responses with combative snark that suggests you're behaving emotionally and defensively because you feel attacked by other people disagreeing with you and pointing out problems with your stances.

If I have it wrong and you're not being a troll or an irrational jerk, then I encourage you to continue this conversation while making an effort to be a bit more polite to your fellow posters. Intentional or not, your writing voice is coming across in an unflattering way.

I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different than Aspect Warriors, they're just Aspect Warriors turned into a character. Oh wait, you said Exarchs. I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different from Sergeants... I mean Exarchs in a way that Chapter Masters just aren't fundamentally different from Captains. Did you ask yourself why your own logic applied in the other direction was "trollish" but not when you used it? I mean if you really want to argue in good faith, what you're doing is an informal fallacy called special pleading. And its rather inaccurate too.

beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't.

A beatstick who modifies the unit it is leading. Like a Chapter Master who gives the unit he's leading the movement abilities to advance or fallback and still shoot and/or charge? Or gives them a +1 to Advance and Charge Rolls? Adding +1A and +1S to their fight weapons? Giving them Sustained Hits 1 and 1 CP per round that makes everyone use more Strats? FNP? Being able to Use Rapid Ingress and Heroic Intervention for Free and Repeat? I mean its not EXACTLY dropping Grenades from Deepstrike but every Chapter Master appears to allow the unit they're leading to do something they couldn't do without the leader. So that appears to be the same between Chapter Masters and Phoenix Lords. And nearly every leader unit everywhere. It appears Phoenix Lords are not fundamentally different than Captains either. Good Faith Question: You see where I'm coming from here, right?

This part is a good distillation of why I suspect you're either not engaging with the posts of others honestly or else are failing to comprehend the points people are making. In my previous posts, I've:
A.) Repeatedly stated that I was on the fence about whether or not phoenix lords warranted bespoke datasheets given that there are, in fact, ways that you could perhaps represent them with something like a character exarch datasheet or just more customizable exarchs in general. How well this would work would largely come down to whether or not the designers want to reflect the things that make PLs different from exarchs on the tabletop.
B.) I've stated that some of the special rules tied to named characters shouldn't necessarily go away but rather become an option for a generic datasheet.

So hypothetically, we could add a generic Exarch Character datasheet to the game. You could give them the option to take a shuriken cannon and a reaper helmet and Maugan Ra's mortal wound rule, and you'd essentially end up with the ability to represent Maugan Ra through these build-an-exarch rules. Whether or not PLs are sufficiently skillful, durable, have enough magical stuff going on, etc. compared to exarchs is its own topic that I'm intentionally not getting into for the sake of focusing on the topic at hand. Similarly, you could give captains (or just jump pack captains? ) options for an uppy downy rule like Shrike's. (Another character that I use.)

What I was getting at with point 1 in the quoted text above is that there isn't really an existing generic phoenix lord type datasheet. So where it's obvious that we'd want to plug Shrike's rules into a captain datasheet (because he's a captain), the closest existing thing eldar have is probably an autarch? And you could probably use the autarch datasheet in place of the "Exarch Character" datasheet, but you'd be asking it to wear a lot of hats because it would have to provide options not only to fill the roles previously filled by 7+ phoenix lord datasheets, but also the Ender Wiggin battlefield commander type role that they currently fill. But that's more of a discussion of how to organize customization options than anything.

Its not the name, its the rule(s) itself. EPIC HERO. And no I don't literally mean its an epic hero. I mean the rules for EPIC HERO - in the first place mean everyone needs to get some for balance - and for another says GW Made the guy, and they made the guy to be one and only one. Even if you could still make Chapter Master Steve Angryfire, he would not be an Epic Hero, and you can have three of him. But you can't have three of Calgar. That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

See, I feel like this is kind of backwards. You're saying that the unit is 0-1, and therefor it needs to be made more powerful in order to justify being a 0-1. I'm saying that if the only reason Calgar is a 0-1 is that he's stronger, then maybe he shouldn't be 0-1 in the first place. Because then you end up with super special power fists that are just better than other power fists because reasons, and you end up with melee-focused chapter masters being better than any other chapter master in the galaxy at melee (essentially making all other chapter masters with less optimal melee rules -1 versions of the named guys.) If you instead just made Calgar style fist+storm bolter weapons a generic option, players of any chapter could just... have that loadout. No need to make them a 0-1 thing.

Which is why I feel like 0-1 restrictions (which is more or less what EPIC HERO is) should mostly be reserved for units that are supposed to be so rare or weird that they shouldn't show up in large numbers. 0-1 on a crisis suit commander with a powerful melee weapon means that you can have a melee commander in tau while still conveying the idea that melee is an unusual approach for tau in general. If you had 6 different crisis/coldstar commanders, each with powerful melee weapon running around, it would impact the faction identity somewhat.

0-1 can and should also be used for options that would be too strong in multiples. Balance as well as lore.

For what it’s worth? The forthcoming Maelstrom book is bringing Custom Character Creation rules with it.

Posted in the main rumour thread, but overshadowed by the new Defiler.

Might scratch some itches? But of course, being end of edition I wouldn’t count on it being more that a short term thing for now.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zivixehm/bring-your-own-warlords-to-life-with-custom-character-rules-in-the-maelstrom-crucible-of-champions/

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
For what it’s worth? The forthcoming Maelstrom book is bringing Custom Character Creation rules with it.

Posted in the main rumour thread, but overshadowed by the new Defiler.

Might scratch some itches? But of course, being end of edition I wouldn’t count on it being more that a short term thing for now.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/zivixehm/bring-your-own-warlords-to-life-with-custom-character-rules-in-the-maelstrom-crucible-of-champions/

I am tentatively hopeful for this. But onto tentatively.

It’s a definite cautiously optimistic thing. Not that I play 40K meself.

But interested to see how it works, and whether it’s allowed in Matched Play.

While I generally like the idea of the more sandbox elements of the setting, I'll admit that it never drew me the way the characters of Space Marine and DoW did and I think that's ultimately why things are the way they are now. As much as we all like the idea of creating our own characters, the overwhelming majority is more drawn to learning about characters the setting has created for them.

I think, for all its merits, character creation doesn't have that broad of appeal, particularly for newcomers with almost no way of properly grasping the world they're trying to create a character for. There are definitely people who come in with that mindset off the start, but for a lot of people its more of a barrier in a hobby that already has a lot of them.

That said, I think having a lot of aesthetic options on character kits is a huge plus and something I'd like to see more of. I just think that works better to get people invested in creating their own characters when you don't put much in the way of rules behind them. Creating a bunch of head options is great and weapon options too as long as they're of the "power weapon" variety. Put the rules on them and people actually get less invested in designing the character their way when their way is "bad" in gameplay.

IDK. Getting rambly. TLDR. I think generic characters are cool and would help a lot from having more head options. I think there's a reason that named characters keep getting focus though and I suspect its because custom characters just don't have as broad appeal

 JNAProductions wrote:
Breton, do you honestly not see the difference between a Chapter Master (an experienced Marine and the highest ranked of their Chapter, of which there are approximately 1,000) and a Phoenix Lord (the epitome and originators of the Aspect Shrines of the Eldar, of which there are about 10 total).

Like... I can name every single Phoenix Lord. I did have to Google it, but here you go:

-Asurmen
-Jain Zar
-Fuegan
-Maugan Ra
-Baharroth
-Karandras
-Lhykhis
-Irillyth [FW]
-Drastanta [Missing]

And then the one that's no longer a Phoenix Lord, Arhra.

Yes I honestly don't see it. Because - as I mentioned its special pleading. Games Rules wise, its Unbalanced Marine Hate.Fluff wise, its just personal favoritism. And you didn't name every single Phoenix Lord. You named their "Alter Ego". Bruce Wayne is Batman. Until Dick Grayson is Batman, or Damian Wayne, or Clark Kent, or Alfred, Hugo Strange, Gordon, and on and on. In other words there have been thousands of Jain Zars over the millennia.

I don't know about that, LunarSol. I think people tend to like putting their own spin on things. Look at all the games out their that let you customize your avatar's appearance, etc.

Personally, I like both named canon characters and generic customizable ones. It's cool to get an update on what Jain Zar has been up to or how the ongoing Drazhar drama is going because it gives the setting a sense of continuity and because those characters are cool in their own right.

But being able to tell a million other stories that *don't* focus on the handful of named characters who have datasheets is the meat and potatoes of the setting for me. That's how you can tell your own stories with character arcs and whatnot. When I'm playing games with Baharroth, he needs to return to Baharroth status quo at the end of the story. When I'm playing with my plucky Iybraesil autarch who has defied death despite lacking the Heg's blessing and being in some uncannily dangerous situations, I can take that story a lot of different places.

Breton wrote:

While generally correct there are holes here. Not all Captains would be Tactical Marines. Some would have been Assault Marines too. Some would have even been Devastator Marines. But they're not going to give a Captain a Lascannon with equivalent output to the melee power fist. Another is that there aren't that many Marines in the chapter (most of the time) that will have the same age as a Chapter Master. As you point out they're in combat all the time and thus die faster/sooner/younger because of it so there is SOME merit to them being older and wiser. But that would theoretically also come with physical deterioration. And on the other-other-other hand (as I realize I'm arguing both sides of this over and over) the wounds, and attacks and so forth are the same - I'm brain freezing on the word here.... But like in D&D when you level up and get a new round of hit points. You don't actually get stronger and tougher, you got wiser and craftier. Each hit point isnt a drop of blood, its the number of tricks and skills you have to avoid getting whomped on or to reduce the effect when you can't avoid it. Same here. A powerfist can crumple an armored tank (in the fluff which is sort of what we're talking about here). Dante can get hit by one 3 times. He's not three times tougher than a tank. He's just so experienced he can twist out of the way, deflect or other wise lessen the impact of getting punched in the face.

Chapter masters aren't recruited based on age. Not even Grimnar or Dante are the oldest marine active in their chapters. And Ragnar is the youngest ever Wolf Lord the space wolves have ever had. Chapter masters are recruited through the chapter's officer pool, which usually goes Sergeant, veteran sergeant, captain, chapter master. With the reintroduction of Lieutenants, you have another layer between sergeants and captains. But all chapter masters were once a captain, and a captain a sergeant. The speed at which they went up that chain is only partially related to skill. The practical need for retaining a functional C&C also sees people go up ranks much faster than normal.

And having once been an assault marine is not the same thing as spending every waking moment for 400 years as an assault marine. Captains physically can't train equal time into melee while also learning strategy and tactics. That's why officer training is different. Captains train to lead. They all have the same 24 hours in the day, and it gets assigned to different skill sets differently.

The only reason captains and chapter masters are uber is because heroic fiction demands named characters be amazing to keep our attention. But in reality, A vanguard veteran assault marine will be a superior combatant to a captain.

Similarly, the tricks and experience to avoid being hit are not suddenly acquired by captains when they make that rank. And there will be veteran marines with more experience at surviving frontal assault warfare with BETTER tricks and experience, so they should have 5 wounds and some captains should only have 2.

LunarSol wrote:While I generally like the idea of the more sandbox elements of the setting, I'll admit that it never drew me the way the characters of Space Marine and DoW did and I think that's ultimately why things are the way they are now. As much as we all like the idea of creating our own characters, the overwhelming majority is more drawn to learning about characters the setting has created for them.

I think, for all its merits, character creation doesn't have that broad of appeal, particularly for newcomers with almost no way of properly grasping the world they're trying to create a character for. There are definitely people who come in with that mindset off the start, but for a lot of people its more of a barrier in a hobby that already has a lot of them.

That said, I think having a lot of aesthetic options on character kits is a huge plus and something I'd like to see more of. I just think that works better to get people invested in creating their own characters when you don't put much in the way of rules behind them. Creating a bunch of head options is great and weapon options too as long as they're of the "power weapon" variety. Put the rules on them and people actually get less invested in designing the character their way when their way is "bad" in gameplay.

IDK. Getting rambly. TLDR. I think generic characters are cool and would help a lot from having more head options. I think there's a reason that named characters keep getting focus though and I suspect its because custom characters just don't have as broad appeal

This is kind of a given when they can't commodify and commercialise every person's individual character though. When they create their own they can sell it on lunch boxes, inherently making it more profitable. But that's not the same thing as player popularity.

Back in 2-3rd ed when special characters were exceptions rather than in every army, the game forced you to consider making your own character rather than accepting a prebuilt one. And people took pride in it. On these forums people would publish the backstory to their autarch, or warboss, describing how they got their equipment and their various battles.


Hell when the armageddon codex came out and I decided to make a company of salamanders, I decided to give each and every marine a backstory, built around a narrative where they were ambushed by dark eldar and lost their command staff, so the new captain was the senior sergeant and has a big chip on his shoulder to find the dark eldar. And many of the survivors of that attack have physical deformaties and scars from the toxins they were hit with.

I never finished it as usual. I think I had a name for every marine but only back story for about 20%.


With GW controlled and marketed special characters, we are seeing the enforced popularity that marines get in microcosm across all factions.

 LunarSol wrote:
While I generally like the idea of the more sandbox elements of the setting, I'll admit that it never drew me the way the characters of Space Marine and DoW did and I think that's ultimately why things are the way they are now. As much as we all like the idea of creating our own characters, the overwhelming majority is more drawn to learning about characters the setting has created for them.

I think, for all its merits, character creation doesn't have that broad of appeal, particularly for newcomers with almost no way of properly grasping the world they're trying to create a character for. There are definitely people who come in with that mindset off the start, but for a lot of people its more of a barrier in a hobby that already has a lot of them.

That said, I think having a lot of aesthetic options on character kits is a huge plus and something I'd like to see more of. I just think that works better to get people invested in creating their own characters when you don't put much in the way of rules behind them. Creating a bunch of head options is great and weapon options too as long as they're of the "power weapon" variety. Put the rules on them and people actually get less invested in designing the character their way when their way is "bad" in gameplay.

IDK. Getting rambly. TLDR. I think generic characters are cool and would help a lot from having more head options. I think there's a reason that named characters keep getting focus though and I suspect its because custom characters just don't have as broad appeal

I think the characters are popular for a few reasons. They're unique. They're GW created, not player created. (And I would say that even if they gave us a character creation matrix that let us create our own - they're still GW created because they came from the GW balanced matrix as opposed to some rando in the store who says his Chapter Master is Marneus Abby-Guilliman with the homebrew rules to prove it) They're usually either the "Face of the Franchise" or they're the "Black Sheep" that turns the franchise on its head. I mean I made a lot of Armies with Calgar who is THE Ultramarine. I made a lot of armies with Sergeant Chronus who is... definitely not anywhere close to a typical Ultramarine. But they (and their armies) were both very iconic and thematic for said Ultramarines. I think a fully complete and robust Leader Generation Matrix where you start with a Character Datasheet, get to pick some small number of 30ish different Major and/or Minor Enhancements, and then you can go shopping for one of about 30ish Major and/or Minor wargear combinations. People will have fun with that. Some will just have fun seeing what they can do, some will be min/maxers for a tournament. Some will be Black Library fans trying to recreate their favorite characters. But the reason it has no appeal right now is it doesn't exist.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Right. In the text you quoted, I understood that you were rewriting my own sentence with marines in the place of phoenix lords, and then I proceeded to give reasons why I feel that the comparison doesn't hold up. I also pointed out that I'd included an eldar character (Eldrad) that I thought was unworthy of a bespoke datasheet and also provided several other examples of named characters (including ones that I use frequently) that also weren't deserving of bespoke datasheets.

Not only did you say Marines shouldn't have Epic Heroes, you even included one sacrificial Eldar character you probably neither use nor like. That's definitely proof it wasn't Marine Hate. Hey, we should totally get rid of all Eldar Characters. And Captain Tycho. All Eldar characters and Captain Tycho so it doesn't sound like Eldar Hate.

Good Faith Question: You see where I'm coming from here, right?

I think I do, and it's unfortunately unflattering for you. Giving you the benefit of the doubt (that you aren't just rage baiting), it appears that you're failing to understand the points being made and to engage with them meaningfully. Instead, you appear to be intent on lacing your responses with combative snark that suggests you're behaving emotionally and defensively because you feel attacked by other people disagreeing with you and pointing out problems with your stances.

If I have it wrong and you're not being a troll or an irrational jerk, then I encourage you to continue this conversation while making an effort to be a bit more polite to your fellow posters. Intentional or not, your writing voice is coming across in an unflattering way.

I will be more polite to my fellow posters when they're more polite to me? How many times did I have to correct JNAProductions when they claimed I didn't say something I did, or said something I didn't, or reclaimed something I'd already disproved? Meanwhile Lord Damocles has engaged in HONEST good faith without lying about who said what or someone being the only one to get super mastercrafted stuff, and he got those more polite replies.

I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different than Aspect Warriors, they're just Aspect Warriors turned into a character. Oh wait, you said Exarchs. I'll do it again. Phoenix Lords are fundamentally no different from Sergeants... I mean Exarchs in a way that Chapter Masters just aren't fundamentally different from Captains. Did you ask yourself why your own logic applied in the other direction was "trollish" but not when you used it? I mean if you really want to argue in good faith, what you're doing is an informal fallacy called special pleading. And its rather inaccurate too.

beatsticks and/or modify the behaviors of aspect units in ways that autarchs can't.

A beatstick who modifies the unit it is leading. Like a Chapter Master who gives the unit he's leading the movement abilities to advance or fallback and still shoot and/or charge? Or gives them a +1 to Advance and Charge Rolls? Adding +1A and +1S to their fight weapons? Giving them Sustained Hits 1 and 1 CP per round that makes everyone use more Strats? FNP? Being able to Use Rapid Ingress and Heroic Intervention for Free and Repeat? I mean its not EXACTLY dropping Grenades from Deepstrike but every Chapter Master appears to allow the unit they're leading to do something they couldn't do without the leader. So that appears to be the same between Chapter Masters and Phoenix Lords. And nearly every leader unit everywhere. It appears Phoenix Lords are not fundamentally different than Captains either. Good Faith Question: You see where I'm coming from here, right?

This part is a good distillation of why I suspect you're either not engaging with the posts of others honestly or else are failing to comprehend the points people are making. In my previous posts, I've:
A.) Repeatedly stated that I was on the fence about whether or not phoenix lords warranted bespoke datasheets given that there are, in fact, ways that you could perhaps represent them with something like a character exarch datasheet or just more customizable exarchs in general. How well this would work would largely come down to whether or not the designers want to reflect the things that make PLs different from exarchs on the tabletop.
B.) I've stated that some of the special rules tied to named characters shouldn't necessarily go away but rather become an option for a generic datasheet.

So hypothetically, we could add a generic Exarch Character datasheet to the game. You could give them the option to take a shuriken cannon and a reaper helmet and Maugan Ra's mortal wound rule, and you'd essentially end up with the ability to represent Maugan Ra through these build-an-exarch rules. Whether or not PLs are sufficiently skillful, durable, have enough magical stuff going on, etc. compared to exarchs is its own topic that I'm intentionally not getting into for the sake of focusing on the topic at hand. Similarly, you could give captains (or just jump pack captains? ) options for an uppy downy rule like Shrike's. (Another character that I use.)

What I was getting at with point 1 in the quoted text above is that there isn't really an existing generic phoenix lord type datasheet. So where it's obvious that we'd want to plug Shrike's rules into a captain datasheet (because he's a captain), the closest existing thing eldar have is probably an autarch? And you could probably use the autarch datasheet in place of the "Exarch Character" datasheet, but you'd be asking it to wear a lot of hats because it would have to provide options not only to fill the roles previously filled by 7+ phoenix lord datasheets, but also the Ender Wiggin battlefield commander type role that they currently fill. But that's more of a discussion of how to organize customization options than anything.

Its not the name, its the rule(s) itself. EPIC HERO. And no I don't literally mean its an epic hero. I mean the rules for EPIC HERO - in the first place mean everyone needs to get some for balance - and for another says GW Made the guy, and they made the guy to be one and only one. Even if you could still make Chapter Master Steve Angryfire, he would not be an Epic Hero, and you can have three of him. But you can't have three of Calgar. That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

See, I feel like this is kind of backwards. You're saying that the unit is 0-1, and therefor it needs to be made more powerful in order to justify being a 0-1. I'm saying that if the only reason Calgar is a 0-1 is that he's stronger, then maybe he shouldn't be 0-1 in the first place. Because then you end up with super special power fists that are just better than other power fists because reasons, and you end up with melee-focused chapter masters being better than any other chapter master in the galaxy at melee (essentially making all other chapter masters with less optimal melee rules -1 versions of the named guys.) If you instead just made Calgar style fist+storm bolter weapons a generic option, players of any chapter could just... have that loadout. No need to make them a 0-1 thing.

Which is why I feel like 0-1 restrictions (which is more or less what EPIC HERO is) should mostly be reserved for units that are supposed to be so rare or weird that they shouldn't show up in large numbers. 0-1 on a crisis suit commander with a powerful melee weapon means that you can have a melee commander in tau while still conveying the idea that melee is an unusual approach for tau in general. If you had 6 different crisis/coldstar commanders, each with powerful melee weapon running around, it would impact the faction identity somewhat.

See this is why you don't get polite replies I literally clarified the opposite because I knew someone dishonest would in bad faith make this claim.

That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

You even quoted it and still analyzed it in the bad faith manor.

 JNAProductions wrote:
I apologize for being overly critical.

But why should named characters (who, yes, can be noted for being exceptional sword fighters, or brawlers, or tacticians, or leaders, or...) automatically be better than generic ones?

Your earlier post said that a generic captain should be able to get 5 TL Powerfist attacks and 3 TL Bolt Pistol or 1d6 TL Flamer shots.
Why should Calgar have an extra attack with extra AP and extra damage?

I did apologize, you know.
And even if you're still mad at me, why are you mad at Wyldhunt?

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Breton, do you honestly not see the difference between a Chapter Master (an experienced Marine and the highest ranked of their Chapter, of which there are approximately 1,000) and a Phoenix Lord (the epitome and originators of the Aspect Shrines of the Eldar, of which there are about 10 total).

Like... I can name every single Phoenix Lord. I did have to Google it, but here you go:

-Asurmen
-Jain Zar
-Fuegan
-Maugan Ra
-Baharroth
-Karandras
-Lhykhis
-Irillyth [FW]
-Drastanta [Missing]

And then the one that's no longer a Phoenix Lord, Arhra.

Yes I honestly don't see it. Because - as I mentioned its special pleading. Games Rules wise, its Unbalanced Marine Hate.Fluff wise, its just personal favoritism. And you didn't name every single Phoenix Lord. You named their "Alter Ego". Bruce Wayne is Batman. Until Dick Grayson is Batman, or Damian Wayne, or Clark Kent, or Alfred, Hugo Strange, Gordon, and on and on. In other words there have been thousands of Jain Zars over the millennia.

This is also not the same thing.

Batman is, generally, Bruce Wayne. But Batman, as Damian Wayne, has significant differences.

Jain Zar is Jain Zar regardless of what the current meat inside the suit is. The Eldar's memories and abilities will be added to the collective that's within the Phoenix Lord, but that's a tiny fraction of the overall total.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
I don't know about that, LunarSol. I think people tend to like putting their own spin on things. Look at all the games out their that let you customize your avatar's appearance, etc.

I don't disagree actually, which is why I emphasized the need for head options and the like. Cosmetic elements even when that includes weaponry. I think people even like it when the weapons have mechanical distinction, but that crumbles a bit when those mechanical distinctions don't work well in game. I think there's good design space there, I just also think when there's a heavy mechanical distinction between options, players tend to get hung up on that rather than the potential inherent in designing your own leader.

 LunarSol wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:
I don't know about that, LunarSol. I think people tend to like putting their own spin on things. Look at all the games out their that let you customize your avatar's appearance, etc.

I don't disagree actually, which is why I emphasized the need for head options and the like. Cosmetic elements even when that includes weaponry. I think people even like it when the weapons have mechanical distinction, but that crumbles a bit when those mechanical distinctions don't work well in game. I think there's good design space there, I just also think when there's a heavy mechanical distinction between options, players tend to get hung up on that rather than the potential inherent in designing your own leader.

It's why rules need to have meaningful differences. (And, ideally, some should have stuff that can't be easily reduced to mathhammer.)

Power Weapons in 8th and 9th were an excellent example of how NOT to do it. They were literally just a math problem to be solved for maximum damage, and they weren't especially different even when you got it right.
Power Weapons in 7th were a better example to follow-not AMAZING by any means, but much better.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
I apologize for being overly critical.

But why should named characters (who, yes, can be noted for being exceptional sword fighters, or brawlers, or tacticians, or leaders, or...) automatically be better than generic ones?

Your earlier post said that a generic captain should be able to get 5 TL Powerfist attacks and 3 TL Bolt Pistol or 1d6 TL Flamer shots.
Why should Calgar have an extra attack with extra AP and extra damage?

I did apologize, you know.
And even if you're still mad at me, why are you mad at Wyldhunt?

I'm not mad? You're strangers on the internet. And did I just not show Wyldhunt doing the same thing?

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Breton, do you honestly not see the difference between a Chapter Master (an experienced Marine and the highest ranked of their Chapter, of which there are approximately 1,000) and a Phoenix Lord (the epitome and originators of the Aspect Shrines of the Eldar, of which there are about 10 total).

Like... I can name every single Phoenix Lord. I did have to Google it, but here you go:

-Asurmen
-Jain Zar
-Fuegan
-Maugan Ra
-Baharroth
-Karandras
-Lhykhis
-Irillyth [FW]
-Drastanta [Missing]

And then the one that's no longer a Phoenix Lord, Arhra.

Yes I honestly don't see it. Because - as I mentioned its special pleading. Games Rules wise, its Unbalanced Marine Hate.Fluff wise, its just personal favoritism. And you didn't name every single Phoenix Lord. You named their "Alter Ego". Bruce Wayne is Batman. Until Dick Grayson is Batman, or Damian Wayne, or Clark Kent, or Alfred, Hugo Strange, Gordon, and on and on. In other words there have been thousands of Jain Zars over the millennia.

This is also not the same thing.

Batman is, generally, Bruce Wayne. But Batman, as Damian Wayne, has significant differences.

Jain Zar is Jain Zar regardless of what the current meat inside the suit is. The Eldar's memories and abilities will be added to the collective that's within the Phoenix Lord, but that's a tiny fraction of the overall total.

So they're not the same, which is the point I was just making? The next one will be "more" than the previous one?

Also wouldn't Chapter Master of the Ultramarines have significant differences if it were Titus, Sicarius, or Agemman?

As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Typhus, as a model I own (the old version of) has a unique position in the lore. But looking at his current datasheet, I see...

-1/2 bonus attack(s) on his melee weapon, Strike and Sweep respectively
-Defensive leading special rule instead of offensive (-1 to-hit vs. SH1 and Lance)
-Offensive personal special rule instead of defensive (MW generating psychic ability vs. stand back up with 3 Wounds)

The second and third points are a decent enough example of what could be differences between character builds-one helps the squad live, the other helps them kill. Season with a personal ability to taste.
The first point, where Typhus is just a bit killier than any other melee Death Guard Lord... That doesn't need to be a thing unique to him. Not by a long shot.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Off-hand, the characters I'd want to stay wholly unique are...

-Primarchs (Loyalist and Daemon)
-Maybe some overall faction leaders, like Ghaz and the Silent King

And that's about it. So Marines would STILL have the most named characters-Guilliman and The Lion.
Every other faction would have zero to one.

I'd also like to point out that I don't want to remove Calgar from the lore or tabletop. (Well, I wouldn't mind if he got killed off, but that's because 40k should be significantly more lethal than it currently is for named characters.) Just because Chapter Master Minning of the Diamond Hearts can have Calgar's loadout doesn't make Calgar stop being a thing.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Typhus, as a model I own (the old version of) has a unique position in the lore. But looking at his current datasheet, I see...

-1/2 bonus attack(s) on his melee weapon, Strike and Sweep respectively
-Defensive leading special rule instead of offensive (-1 to-hit vs. SH1 and Lance)
-Offensive personal special rule instead of defensive (MW generating psychic ability vs. stand back up with 3 Wounds)

The second and third points are a decent enough example of what could be differences between character builds-one helps the squad live, the other helps them kill. Season with a personal ability to taste.
The first point, where Typhus is just a bit killier than any other melee Death Guard Lord... That doesn't need to be a thing unique to him. Not by a long shot.

He can also lead Poxwalkers, and has the PSYKER keyword. He does not have the GRENADES keyword. He cannot get an Enhancement - though I would posit the very potent Offensive and Ranged bespoke plus the minor upgrade to his wargear/weapons are equivalent to whatever enhancement one would pick. There are more differences than you thought.

Edit to Add: As an aside, having just looked at a bunch of the Enhancements out there, am I wrong in thinking he's not even as good as a Lord of Contagion for leading Deathguard Terminator units? Which is why he can lead the Poxwalkers?

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Typhus, as a model I own (the old version of) has a unique position in the lore. But looking at his current datasheet, I see...

-1/2 bonus attack(s) on his melee weapon, Strike and Sweep respectively
-Defensive leading special rule instead of offensive (-1 to-hit vs. SH1 and Lance)
-Offensive personal special rule instead of defensive (MW generating psychic ability vs. stand back up with 3 Wounds)

The second and third points are a decent enough example of what could be differences between character builds-one helps the squad live, the other helps them kill. Season with a personal ability to taste.
The first point, where Typhus is just a bit killier than any other melee Death Guard Lord... That doesn't need to be a thing unique to him. Not by a long shot.

He can also lead Poxwalkers, and has the PSYKER keyword. He does not have the GRENADES keyword. He cannot get an Enhancement - though I would posit the very potent Offensive and Ranged bespoke plus the minor upgrade to his wargear/weapons are equivalent to whatever enhancement one would pick. There are more differences than you thought.

And why should any of that be unique?

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Off-hand, the characters I'd want to stay wholly unique are...

-Primarchs (Loyalist and Daemon)
-Maybe some overall faction leaders, like Ghaz and the Silent King

And that's about it. So Marines would STILL have the most named characters-Guilliman and The Lion.
Every other faction would have zero to one.

Well, fortunately GW won't be listening to you.

ccs wrote:
Well, fortunately GW won't be listening to you.

I'm aware I'm largely just yelling into the void, but gosh darnit, I want options! I want customization!

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Off-hand, the characters I'd want to stay wholly unique are...

-Primarchs (Loyalist and Daemon)
-Maybe some overall faction leaders, like Ghaz and the Silent King

And that's about it. So Marines would STILL have the most named characters-Guilliman and The Lion.
Every other faction would have zero to one.

I'd also like to point out that I don't want to remove Calgar from the lore or tabletop. (Well, I wouldn't mind if he got killed off, but that's because 40k should be significantly more lethal than it currently is for named characters.) Just because Chapter Master Minning of the Diamond Hearts can have Calgar's loadout doesn't make Calgar stop being a thing.

No they wouldn't have more. You cant take both the Lion and Guilliman. They would have 1. or that 1. But not both. And most of them wouldn't have any. Ghaz doesn't have any Subfaction restrictions anymore. I don't think Orks do at all. The Silent King still has a keyword that references Subfactions, but its a regular keyword not a Faction Keyword, and it has no effect I can see. The Avatar of Khaine (I'm assuming he stays right?) does not, and AFAIK has never had a subfaction keyword. Even Eldrad no longer has a subfaction limiter keyword. Even the Chaos Legions no longer have subfaction keywords on named Epic Heroes - not even Fabius Bile who didn't go to the Emperors Children as near as I can tell? So two chapters could have 1 choice. 6 Chapters, and all the successors (both DIY and official ones) would have none. Book and keyword structure aside Loyalist Marines are still seperate iterations based on their subfaction.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Typhus, as a model I own (the old version of) has a unique position in the lore. But looking at his current datasheet, I see...

-1/2 bonus attack(s) on his melee weapon, Strike and Sweep respectively
-Defensive leading special rule instead of offensive (-1 to-hit vs. SH1 and Lance)
-Offensive personal special rule instead of defensive (MW generating psychic ability vs. stand back up with 3 Wounds)

The second and third points are a decent enough example of what could be differences between character builds-one helps the squad live, the other helps them kill. Season with a personal ability to taste.
The first point, where Typhus is just a bit killier than any other melee Death Guard Lord... That doesn't need to be a thing unique to him. Not by a long shot.

He can also lead Poxwalkers, and has the PSYKER keyword. He does not have the GRENADES keyword. He cannot get an Enhancement - though I would posit the very potent Offensive and Ranged bespoke plus the minor upgrade to his wargear/weapons are equivalent to whatever enhancement one would pick. There are more differences than you thought.

And why should any of that be unique?

I'm not sure in this specific case, but generally speaking, that Offensive bespoke sounds very potent and they don't want to allow it to be mix-and-matched with an enhancement or other conveyance (another character that may have even an even better profile to carry that around) - they probably also want to limit something this potent in and of itself: Doing it three times because its not unique would be a pretty quick rival to Thousand Sons and Doom Bolt while retaining Nurgle's Gift and other Deathguard benefits/flavors.

Edit to Add: If the google search I just did for the chances of rolling doubles on two dice, and on the optional 3 dice, Eater Plague is more likely to upcharge (D3+3) and less likely to blow up - though when Doombolt blows up if still goes off it appears. Still that sort of encroachment on Thousand Sons flavor shouldn't be handed out like candy - especially not stacked on top of another Faction Ability.

Why should being a Psyker (with a related ability) and/or leading Poxwalkers be unique?
I don't mind if the exact details change. If the number of MW was dropped or it was changed to an actual weapon, that's entirely fine.

I'm talking about a pretty radical change from where the game is now. It would require a lot of smaller changes too. Not the least of which would be points for options again.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Why should being a Psyker (with a related ability) and/or leading Poxwalkers be unique?
I don't mind if the exact details change. If the number of MW was dropped or it was changed to an actual weapon, that's entirely fine.

I'm talking about a pretty radical change from where the game is now. It would require a lot of smaller changes too. Not the least of which would be points for options again.

It isn't unique. Well maybe the Poxwalker thing but I don't think so but the sum total of the differences might end up being something unique. (As its currently created) it should be a weapon to avoid edge case rule problems, but I don't think they can do the Crit Fail - Success - Crit Success evolution with that mechanic. This specific ability I don't think should be here. I'd do it as a weapon, possibly a weapon allowed to shoot all units within a short range (similar to the old Hammerfall Array) that then does X number + Blast of low S Anti-Infantry 2+ or Anti-Vehicle 2+ or Anti-whatever 2+ attacks. I mean don't take the numbers as gospel its just a theme example: Three Profiles

Range: Every unit within Melee/6"/12" whatever range works for balance Maybe TORRENT too but it may have to be a little weaker or one target only if it skips rolling to hit

Pick 1 eater plague profile:

3A BLAST S3 AP0 D1 Anti Infantry2+

3A S3 AP0 D2 Anti-Monster 2+

3A S3 AP0 D3 Anti-Vehicle 2+

Just something to represent a miasma of death and decay that emanates from Typhus (or whoever)

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Not understanding the point you're making here.

Guilliman has 1 less keyword than those 2, are you saying have more or less keywords makes you more or less parallel?
MONSTER, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, PRIMARCH, ROBOUTE GUILLIMAN

He's a monster instead of infantry, and has primarch instead of phoenix lord or captain.

You understand that these key words are used to provide abilities right? If Zar didn't have aspect warrior she couldn't use aspect warrior keyed abilities/strategems, similar to Lysander.

I'm not getting the point you're trying to make.

the swarmlord has 8! keywords, does that make him more or less unique?


You're being very selective in your definitions of phrases like 'very much like' when making your argument.

A marine captain and a tactical marine are identical. They are augmented humans with cool equipment. one has a higher rank than the other. But they have no differences at all. There are even tactical marines that are older than captains with more experience. Their only actual known difference that will be true for all examples, is their rank.

A phoenix lord is fundamentally NOT just an aspect warrior and there are no aspect warriors older or with more experience than them. They are definitionally distinct as they founded the art of war their aspects follow, making it impossible for any to be older than them. They are also supernatural creatures, running on a soul gestalt housed in a suit of armour that eats people to resurrect itself. Fundamentally not the same as an aspect warrior. Your argument that phoenix lord is just a rank keyword proves you don't know what you're arguing. It's not a rank at all. It's a state of being.


Trying to say that the way they chose to represent these facts about those characters makes them equivalent is so disingenuous I can see why Wyldhunt felt like it was trolling.

That's like claiming grots are the equivalent of custodes because they both have infantry in their keywords and use the BS stat. Or that a grot and a tank are very much alike because they both have toughness values.

Trying to use ingame abstract mechanics to claim that the fictional existence of entities in 40k are equivalent is an impressive level of mental gymnastics.


EDIT: Belisarius Cawl has the same keywords as Guilliman, excepting the " faction/name based" ones.

MONSTER, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TECH-PRIEST, CULT MECHANICUS, BELISARIUS CAWL

Just as primarch is more than a rank, so too is Phoenix Lord.

 Hellebore wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

Two bespoke rules. Bespoke weapon(s).

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

Not understanding the point you're making here.

Guilliman has 1 less keyword than those 2, are you saying have more or less keywords makes you more or less parallel?
MONSTER, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, PRIMARCH, ROBOUTE GUILLIMAN

Let me try again. They have 7 Keywords. Three of them are EXACTLY the same. Four of them are directly parallel/equivalent versions that would be exactly the same, but are only different because of the flavor text of the army.

He's a monster instead of infantry, and has primarch instead of phoenix lord or captain.

You understand that these key words are used to provide abilities right? If Zar didn't have aspect warrior she couldn't use aspect warrior keyed abilities/strategems, similar to Lysander.

You mean like the TERMINATOR keyword used for TERMINATOR directed strats? As you just pointed out "similar to Lysander"?

I'm not getting the point you're trying to make.

the swarmlord has 8! keywords, does that make him more or less unique?

I think you lost the thread. The discussion was not about them being unique. The discussion was about if they were similar or different. I'm going to assume you now regret saying "similar to Lysander" so I'll pretend you didn't just admit the point.

You're being very selective in your definitions of phrases like 'very much like' when making your argument.

A marine captain and a tactical marine are identical. They are augmented humans with cool equipment. one has a higher rank than the other. But they have no differences at all. There are even tactical marines that are older than captains with more experience. Their only actual known difference that will be true for all examples, is their rank.

Yes, they do. They have different stat lines. They have some different keywords that differ in more than just (Faction Specfic Armor Name). They are similar. They are not identical.

A phoenix lord is fundamentally NOT just an aspect warrior and there are no aspect warriors older or with more experience than them. They are definitionally distinct as they founded the art of war their aspects follow, making it impossible for any to be older than them. They are also supernatural creatures, running on a soul gestalt housed in a suit of armour that eats people to resurrect itself. Fundamentally not the same as an aspect warrior.

Trying to say that the way they chose to represent these facts about those characters makes them equivalent is so disingenuous I can see why Wyldhunt felt like it was trolling.

That's like claiming grots are the equivalent of custodes because they both have infantry in their keywords and use the BS stat. Or that a grot and a tank are very much alike because they both have toughness values.

Again you have lost the thread here. Similar is not identical. Its definitely not equivalent.

Trying to use ingame abstract mechanics to claim that the fictional existence of entities in 40k are equivalent is an impressive level of mental gymnastics.

Trying to use your personal head cannon to claim that they're not is an impressive level of gymnastics.

Lets play a game. I'm going to read you parts of a datasheet. You tell me who it is. Movement is 12". Maybe 14". Toughness is either 3 or 4. Save is either 2+ or 3+. Definitely a 4++ Invuln. Definitely 5 Wounds, and a 6+ Leadership and OC1. 6, maybe 7 S5 -2 D2 melee attacks a bespoke that lets you move them and their unit into Strategic Reserves along with one more. Who is it?

Breton wrote:
Not only did you say Marines shouldn't have Epic Heroes, you even included one sacrificial Eldar character you probably neither use nor like. That's definitely proof it wasn't Marine Hate. Hey, we should totally get rid of all Eldar Characters. And Captain Tycho. All Eldar characters and Captain Tycho so it doesn't sound like Eldar Hate.

I didn't say marines shouldn't have epic heroes. I said marines are especially prone to having epic heroes that aren't weird/unique enough to *need* bespoke datasheets rather than just being covered by the generic datasheets. A lot of their named guys are conceptually just captains, librarians, etc. It wouldn't be weird (in terms of fluff) or game breaking for Shrike's uppy downy rule to be an option for generic captains.

And while I wouldn't call Eldrad a regular staple of my lists, I did field him in literally my most recent eldar game and found him quite useful! And I find his fluff fine. Not the coolest thing ever, but fine. I also listed Ahriman as a character than should lose his bespoke datasheet and specifically stated that I do use him pretty often.

So you've misrepresented me to engage poorly with the points I was making, and you're being unnecessarily rude while doing so. Which, as I pointed out previously, are traits that make me think you might be trolling.

I will be more polite to my fellow posters when they're more polite to me?

You're being rude to me, and I don't *think* I've actually been outright rude to you? I've pointed out how you've been behaving in this thread, and those behaviors are, in my opinion as an armchair internet sleuth, inkeeping with the kind of behavior I'd expect to see from someone intentionally rage-baiting.

See this is why you don't get polite replies I literally clarified the opposite because I knew someone dishonest would in bad faith make this claim.

That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

You even quoted it and still analyzed it in the bad faith manor.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Why should being a Psyker (with a related ability) and/or leading Poxwalkers be unique?
I don't mind if the exact details change. If the number of MW was dropped or it was changed to an actual weapon, that's entirely fine.

I'm talking about a pretty radical change from where the game is now. It would require a lot of smaller changes too. Not the least of which would be points for options again.

The game is not going to change radically though. The current game is both financially successful and widely liked. Any radical change will endanger stakeholder value and therefore will not happen.
In addition, the whole hateboner for named characters is a relic of the distant past. People still clinging to the philosophies of 4th or earlier editions are outnumbered by more than 10:1 by players that came after them. Games like Spacemarine II, Tacticus and DoW heavily focus on named characters and have huge fanbases themselves. GW keeps releasing named characters for novel protagonists because people keep buying them. Primarchs are selling out when they are released. Marine players are buying whole boxes of duplicate units to get that named sergeant for their chapter early.
Without any intent of offending you, if everyone who disliked named characters like you do left the game and never spend a single penny on 40k ever again, GW probably wouldn't even notice - especially since the overlap of long time veterans and people who are spending minimal amounts on GW product is rather large.

So there's your answer. The ship has sailed and it is not coming back. Named characters aren't just accepted into the game, the have become an integral part of it. Neither the management drones at GW, nor the fanbase would support removing them. Just the few people here on dakka who have mostly lost touch with the real community of the game being played years ago.

Breton wrote:

Trying to use your personal head cannon to claim that they're not is an impressive level of gymnastics.

I didn't see anything that was personal headcannon. A Chapter Master is fundamentally just a guy with rank A Phoenix Lord is a sort of immortal demon armor that posesses the wearer. There may have been hundreds of thousands of Chapter Masters since the OG foundings. The Phoenix Lords have been the same entities for millenia, reborn time and again. Phoenix Lords are more akin to Primarchs of their respective shrines in terms of "history", and more like Lucius the Eternal in manifestation.

I’m gonna agree that Phoenix Lords are something else entirely.

Yes, each incumbent adds knowledge and experience to the whole. But, it appears the dominant spirit/personality is that of the original.

Same as Cawl’s completely not illegal never gone get burned at the stake for that one tech, which allows him to subsume the knowledge and experiences of others into his own, without those personalities really competing with his own.

Both are essentially parasitical routes to immortality and learning.

When Calgar, Azrael, Dante and all inevitably meet their end? Their chosen successor may well take up their arms and armour. But they don’t assume the mantle of the person.

Batman I see a third thing. Batman isn’t Bruce Wayne. Batman is as much an idea and perhaps an ideal as a living person. The cowl and the mission are Batman to Gotham and its populace. And so it is a mantle, like Black Panther, that can be passed on. And so just as T’Challa didn’t become his father, or Shuri become T’Challa? Damian Wayne didn’t become Bruce Wayne. They did become Black Panther, and all that embodies to the Wakandan people, and The Batman and all that embodies to Gothamites.

 LunarSol wrote:
While I generally like the idea of the more sandbox elements of the setting, I'll admit that it never drew me the way the characters of Space Marine and DoW did and I think that's ultimately why things are the way they are now. As much as we all like the idea of creating our own characters, the overwhelming majority is more drawn to learning about characters the setting has created for them.

I think, for all its merits, character creation doesn't have that broad of appeal, particularly for newcomers with almost no way of properly grasping the world they're trying to create a character for. There are definitely people who come in with that mindset off the start, but for a lot of people its more of a barrier in a hobby that already has a lot of them.

That said, I think having a lot of aesthetic options on character kits is a huge plus and something I'd like to see more of. I just think that works better to get people invested in creating their own characters when you don't put much in the way of rules behind them. Creating a bunch of head options is great and weapon options too as long as they're of the "power weapon" variety. Put the rules on them and people actually get less invested in designing the character their way when their way is "bad" in gameplay.

IDK. Getting rambly. TLDR. I think generic characters are cool and would help a lot from having more head options. I think there's a reason that named characters keep getting focus though and I suspect its because custom characters just don't have as broad appeal

I think it's fair to query how much of this is down to how GW sells elements of the game.

Anyone remember GW's old website? There were pages where designers would show off their armies and how they'd made custom characters to lead them.

Now everything is just focused on what you can buy from the GW webstore.

Likewise, you cite games where you play as defined characters, yet surely that only highlights the point that even the video-games promote the use of pre-made characters, rather than letting players make and play as their own Space Marine characters?

I'm reminded of the old adage that Space Marines need to get more support because they're the most popular faction. Yet this theory never seems to consider that the fact that SMs may in fact be related to them getting near-constant releases, on top of being the poster-boys, the main protagonists of virtually all the fiction, the faction that's included in all the starter sets etc.

By the same measure, it doesn't seem unreasonable to speculate that GW's constant promotion of pre-made characters and off-the-shelf models might actually play a role in newer customers not valuing customisation and 'your dudes' as much as the players of old.

Clearer examples of what the forthcoming character creation rules are bringing.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/en-gb/articles/hjiieqr9/the-warhammer-community-team-put-the-maelstroms-custom-character-rules-to-the-test/

 Jidmah wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Why should being a Psyker (with a related ability) and/or leading Poxwalkers be unique?
I don't mind if the exact details change. If the number of MW was dropped or it was changed to an actual weapon, that's entirely fine.

I'm talking about a pretty radical change from where the game is now. It would require a lot of smaller changes too. Not the least of which would be points for options again.

The game is not going to change radically though. The current game is both financially successful and widely liked. Any radical change will endanger stakeholder value and therefore will not happen.
In addition, the whole hateboner for named characters is a relic of the distant past. People still clinging to the philosophies of 4th or earlier editions are outnumbered by more than 10:1 by players that came after them. Games like Spacemarine II, Tacticus and DoW heavily focus on named characters and have huge fanbases themselves. GW keeps releasing named characters for novel protagonists because people keep buying them. Primarchs are selling out when they are released. Marine players are buying whole boxes of duplicate units to get that named sergeant for their chapter early.
Without any intent of offending you, if everyone who disliked named characters like you do left the game and never spend a single penny on 40k ever again, GW probably wouldn't even notice - especially since the overlap of long time veterans and people who are spending minimal amounts on GW product is rather large.

So there's your answer. The ship has sailed and it is not coming back. Named characters aren't just accepted into the game, the have become an integral part of it. Neither the management drones at GW, nor the fanbase would support removing them. Just the few people here on dakka who have mostly lost touch with the real community of the game being played years ago.

This is the truth of it. Regards "marine hate", marines just get characters invented left, right and centre to the point where there are more than there are units for some armies. They're also ubiquitous in the "introductory your dude" faction. So the two things are at odds.

Many factions have very few special characters for a loooong time and hence gain a sense of renown in the fanbase. If you want a modern example, canis rex is now recognised by people as *the knights hero* and even if there were customisation options, he's that character and cemented in game lore now. There is no other knight character, they're an npc faction in that respect.

Marines however, get a slew every year. They then got so many more customisations options than anyone else did *on top* of this in 9th. So when your small number of epic heroes who have renown and pedigree, in lore and tabletop history is going to resonate more for the community than some recently named marine character who is one of half a dozen characters who are special purely because they're in power armour and have supporting DIY characters with more options than most armies entire wargear menu.

Not saying they deserve hate or bias, not saying they dont deserve characters, just saying that most people will be less invested in a lot of the marine characters and care less if they're gone accordingly. This was hard to phrase.

The new customisation stuff will hopefully be a standard thing in 11th, seems a good halfway house.

Not sure what Breton's on; Phoenix Lords are on another level from Chapter Masters.

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
As a Marine player (primarily, among many other factions), I'd like to say that I don't think for one moment the arguments presented by people in this thread have been "Marine hate" - if anything, they're quite on the money.

It's certainly not the blatant misrepresentation of Eldar Phoenix Lords as anything like a named non-Primarch Space Marine (and this is coming from someone who errs on the negative side when it comes to the idea of playing Eldar).

Eldar Phoenix Lords are very much like a named Non-Primarch.

Keywords for Lysander:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, IMPERIUM, TERMINATOR, CAPTAIN, DARNATH LYSANDER

Keywords for Jain Zar:
INFANTRY, CHARACTER, EPIC HERO, AELDARI, ASPECT WARRIOR, PHOENIX LORD, JAIN ZAR

They're quite literally parallel where the only differences are faction/name based. Terminator vs Aspect Warrior (Faction Armor) Captain vs Phoenix Lord (Faction rank keywords) Lysander vs Jain Zar (Their name)

This is only true if you ignore context.

Are Custodian Wardens and Barbgaunts the same thing, because they both have only three keywords, those being Infantry, Faction Name, and Unit Name?
What a laugh.

I want to make clear: I don't care about their mechanics. I care about how meaningfully distinct *in a lore sense* a character is from either others of their ilk, or if their core archetype (Primarch/Daemon Primarch/shard of divinity/etc) is wholly distinct from the rest of their army. This is, to some degree, subjective.

For example: a Primarch, Avatar of Khaine, or C'Tan Shard is Epic. These are, for the most part, wholly unique from other heroes in their army.
A Daemon Primarch, while ostensibly also a Monster in an army with access to others, is narratively A Big Deal, more so than any other Daemon Prince or Greater Daemon.
A Phoenix Lord, despite being an empowered Exarch, is narratively so so so much more important and powerful than other Exarchs of their Path.
Ghazghskull Thraka is narratively (and in stature!) much more important to the wider Ork faction than any other Warboss.
Farsight, despite not leading all the T'au, is noticeably much more distinct from any other Tau leader in terms of how he fights - on a narrative level. T'au *don't* do what he does, and so he is Epic.

Creed? She's narratively a Castellan of an important group, with some skills to back that up. Not meaningfully so, no more than there might not be another guard commander who can do that.
Calgar? A very capable Chapter Master, among a thousand other Chapter Masters. What does he do *narratively* which other Chapter Masters don't?
Imotekh? A powerful Overlord, among other powerful Overlords. Maybe even the strongest Overlord, outside of the Silent King - but not vastly so.
Eldrad? The best living seer the Eldar have, but outside of that... narratively, what else?
Old One Eye? A tough Carnifex. I'm sure that's never been replicated. /s

This is subjective, obviously: but I don't think I'm the only one who's making this claim. Perhaps, like Jidmah says below, it's not the popular one in the current 40k audience, but it's got its fans. Ultimately, I don't think people hate the idea of unique heroes and named characters - but they need to be MEANINGFULLY Epic (and not just "we gave them good stats!") to be considered so.

And you're more than welcome to believe wanting to squat ALL the Space Marine Epic Heroes and ONE Eldari Epic Hero isnt Marine Hate.

It's not. You're ascribing malice where there isn't none.

Jidmah wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Why should being a Psyker (with a related ability) and/or leading Poxwalkers be unique?
I don't mind if the exact details change. If the number of MW was dropped or it was changed to an actual weapon, that's entirely fine.

I'm talking about a pretty radical change from where the game is now. It would require a lot of smaller changes too. Not the least of which would be points for options again.

The game is not going to change radically though. The current game is both financially successful and widely liked. Any radical change will endanger stakeholder value and therefore will not happen.

Correct (to a point, see what GW did with HH!), but it doesn't stop people having opinions and hopes! But, yes, your post is correct - GW have found that having very merchandisable and recognisable characters is popular with a majority of audiences, or at the very least, the audiences which they are trying to engender themselves to. Folks like their memeable heroes.

I don't really care what happens in 40K as a whole any more, but the gradual shift to main characters over my characters is one of the reasons I don't care and have moved on to other things.

I'm aware that I'm in a small minority of players in that, and I'm perfectly comfortable with that.

I agree with OP to the extent that I'd vastly prefer granular character customization.

That being said, I believe named characters should absolutely exist, but be sidegrades rather than upgrades to generic characters, unlocking special interactions and complementing skew builds.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Breton wrote:
Not only did you say Marines shouldn't have Epic Heroes, you even included one sacrificial Eldar character you probably neither use nor like. That's definitely proof it wasn't Marine Hate. Hey, we should totally get rid of all Eldar Characters. And Captain Tycho. All Eldar characters and Captain Tycho so it doesn't sound like Eldar Hate.

I didn't say marines shouldn't have epic heroes. I said marines are especially prone to having epic heroes that aren't weird/unique enough to *need* bespoke datasheets rather than just being covered by the generic datasheets. A lot of their named guys are conceptually just captains, librarians, etc. It wouldn't be weird (in terms of fluff) or game breaking for Shrike's uppy downy rule to be an option for generic captains.

And while I wouldn't call Eldrad a regular staple of my lists, I did field him in literally my most recent eldar game and found him quite useful! And I find his fluff fine. Not the coolest thing ever, but fine. I also listed Ahriman as a character than should lose his bespoke datasheet and specifically stated that I do use him pretty often.

So you've misrepresented me to engage poorly with the points I was making, and you're being unnecessarily rude while doing so. Which, as I pointed out previously, are traits that make me think you might be trolling.

Bespoke datasheets with the Epic Hero keyword are literally what makes them Epic Heroes. You want to keep YOUR Bespoke Datasheets and get rid of all the bespoke datasheets for Space Marines even though without the name and very minor variations - a point of movement, a point of toughness, a point of armor save give or take and so on depending on the Aspect and the Captain - you can't tell the difference between them. Oh except maybe one or two Space Marine Primarchs. I have represented you entirely correctly.

My understanding from your response is that you were saying:
* The distinction between a named character like calgar and a generic character like steve is essentially just that the Epic Hero rule means you can only have one of the Calgar datasheets in your army but multiples of the Steve datasheets in your army.
* You then seem to be stating that designing Steve to be as strong as Calgar would be imbalanced because you could have three of him whereas having only one Calgar means that it's fine for him to be a little overtuned for his points because you can only take one of him? So you're essentially saying that being 0-1 should be used as a balancing factor for a unit being designed or costed less well than it could have been?
* You also seem to be suggesting that every faction should have some number of these overtuned 0-1 units as a way of balancing factions against eachother.

Is my understanding there incorrect? If not, I think my points were valid. I'm basically arguing that a 0-1 limitation shouldn't be used as a way to balance undercosted units. Instead, Calgar's capabilities should be options for generic captains, and they should be designed in such a way that they don't break the game.
EDIT: Wanted to clarify on this point. 0-1 could be a reasonable limitation for gimmicks or mechanics that are fine when you have one instance of them but problematic if you have multiples. The distinction here being that there's something about the character's mechanics that makes them a problem when taken in multiples; *not* just that the unit does too much damage or is undercosted for what it does. Off the top of my head, maybe one Maugan Ra sprinkling mortal wounds around with his special rule is fine because it's just a bit of chip damage here and there, but three Maugans would be a problem because you're increasing the odds of finishing off units with the sprinkled-on mortal wounds or potentially piling up lots of mortal wounds on a high toughness/good saves target rather than just doing a bit of chip damage to help the rest of your army along.

So you wanted to clarify YOU think it could be for limiting out-of-scope abilities, but you didn't clarify that maybe that's what I thought to? Yeah, its different when you do it. The Ultramarines used to have what was or would have been an epic hero named Antaro Chronus. He was decidedly UN-Powerful. He still should have been an Epic Hero.

Like, I know we're just using Calgar as an example here, but his special rules right now include:
* Inspiring Leader: This is a shoot/charge after advancing/falling back rule. Other captains can probably be inspiring and/or good at fighting in a mobile fashion.
* Master Tactician: Extra CP. Other captains can probably be smarty pants who help their forces execute complex maneuvers (stratagems).
* Honor Guard of Macragge: He gets feel no pain wihle he's attached to a squad of honor guard. Other captains could probably have body guards that are especially good at keeping their bosses from getting sniped out.
* His Armor: It's basically gravis armor with a 2+ instead of a 3+ because reasons. Kind of falls in that territory of just having better than normal gear because the blacksmith decided to give a darn that day, but sure. If Calgar's blacksmith can have a good day, so can some other captain's.

So he's kind of just a bundle of abilities that would make just as much sense on any number of other captains in the galaxy. Just like Eldrad's CP generation, Doom, and Mind War would be perfectly at-home on a generic farseer.

Breton wrote:

And I strongly disagree. Inspiring Leader definitely should NOT be readily available. It is way too mechanic breaking. Multiple people have told you that rule - not the super fists - is the reason people take him. This ability is all three doctrines (from Gladius/Blade of Ultramar) turned on all game long for one unit. You can't stack doctrines in the Dets, and you can't (usually) apply one here and one there. its one doctrine at a time, for the entire army, for one turn. Gladius also doesn't allow you to reuse Doctrines, while Blade does but ONLY if you're taking Calgar. (which I disagree with here). There is also the Bastion Det, which gives the Super Doctrine Combo (and a second boost to advance/fallback and ACTION MONKEY) but only to BATTLELINE units. They are working very hard to keep this off of multiple "elite" units. Terminators, Aggressors, Centurions and such. (which is too bad, it might actually fix Assault Centurions - though they can't get a LEADER so they can't get it FROM a LEADER either) - I wouldn't want to see four LEADERS all with Super Duper Doctrine Always on leading four units of Terminators. Its too potent and to uninteractive.

So make Inspiring Leader only available to one-model-per-army, but make it a generic upgrade that any Chapter Master can take at a hefty cost. I don't see anything game breaking in that.

Breton wrote:

Trying to use your personal head cannon to claim that they're not is an impressive level of gymnastics.

Lets play a game. I'm going to read you parts of a datasheet. You tell me who it is. Movement is 12". Maybe 14". Toughness is either 3 or 4. Save is either 2+ or 3+. Definitely a 4++ Invuln. Definitely 5 Wounds, and a 6+ Leadership and OC1. 6, maybe 7 S5 -2 D2 melee attacks a bespoke that lets you move them and their unit into Strategic Reserves along with one more. Who is it?

You are definitely trolling now. Me quoting what the fething codex says a phoenix lord has been for 35 years is not personal headcanon and if you can't go read that yourself then you've got nothing to add to the conversation at all.

Trying to make abstract rules mechanics that change every edition somehow an objective arbiter is some crazy mental gymnastics and absolutely dishonest. Guilliman was T6 and now is T9, is he now a different character because his stats are different? Karandras has been T6, T4 and now T3. Has his character changed every edition his stats did?

The fiction tells you what a character is and the rules are a method to interpret them in a game. Or do you think that a human shot in the head by a bolter survives 1/3rd of the time because they're only s4?

your argument is asinine and absolutely irrelevant to the conversation.

 RaptorusRex wrote:
Not sure what Breton's on; Phoenix Lords are on another level from Chapter Masters.

In the books MAYBE, not the tabletop. Even in the books, Chapter Masters get a similar level of plot armor. And he didn't say remove them from the books, he said remove them from the tabletop.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

Trying to use your personal head cannon to claim that they're not is an impressive level of gymnastics.

I didn't see anything that was personal headcannon. A Chapter Master is fundamentally just a guy with rank A Phoenix Lord is a sort of immortal demon armor that posesses the wearer. There may have been hundreds of thousands of Chapter Masters since the OG foundings. The Phoenix Lords have been the same entities for millenia, reborn time and again. Phoenix Lords are more akin to Primarchs of their respective shrines in terms of "history", and more like Lucius the Eternal in manifestation.

The Avatar is more akin to a Primarch. Phoenix Lords are more akin to Captains and Chapter Masters.

 vipoid wrote:

I think it's fair to query how much of this is down to how GW sells elements of the game.

Anyone remember GW's old website? There were pages where designers would show off their armies and how they'd made custom characters to lead them.

Now everything is just focused on what you can buy from the GW webstore.

Likewise, you cite games where you play as defined characters, yet surely that only highlights the point that even the video-games promote the use of pre-made characters, rather than letting players make and play as their own Space Marine characters?

I'm reminded of the old adage that Space Marines need to get more support because they're the most popular faction. Yet this theory never seems to consider that the fact that SMs may in fact be related to them getting near-constant releases, on top of being the poster-boys, the main protagonists of virtually all the fiction, the faction that's included in all the starter sets etc.

By the same measure, it doesn't seem unreasonable to speculate that GW's constant promotion of pre-made characters and off-the-shelf models might actually play a role in newer customers not valuing customisation and 'your dudes' as much as the players of old.

There's some interesting studies on the changes to toy manufacturing and product sales in the 80s after Regan removed the limitations on advertising to children. We saw the glut of tv show commercials to sell to kids, Transformers, He Man, Rainbow Bright, My Little Pony, GI Joe etc. Before then kids toys were really free form, you just bought a toy and played with it however you liked (basically how the toys in Toy Story are all different genre of toy mashed together),

With the 80s toys, they started building product ecosystems and used the tv shows as play demonstrations. where before kids would just play with whatever combination of toys they had, they now were being shown there was a 'right' and 'wrong' way to use Transformers toys. The gross 'canon' infected creative play with kids, so that they would police one another over how to correctly use their toys. You couldn't have optimus ride a pony, he had to be on the Ark to do it correctly.

This allowed them to close off their consumers into ecosystems and sell them everything that goes in it. Rather than using the lounge cushions to play on, you had to buy the GI Joe Bases or Castle Grey Skull to play correctly. Kids would replay episodes with their toys rather than invent their own stories. Obviously not always, but the shift to 'lore accurate' play really smashed kid's creative expression, in order to maximise profit. They figured out that they could create social license for a kid's peers to police their play, which kept them buying the correct products.


40k appeared during this phase, but by its nature was a lot more self directed. it encouraged creativity because they physically couldn't produce all the products required to fillout the 40k ecosystem. So personal creativity and self directed play were features to aid the sale of their products. but as the years have gone on, they have filled out their ecosystem and can now keep people wholly within it. 'The GW Hobby'. No more styrofoam packaging buildings, make your own narratives, etc. Every aspect is now purchasable and that social license to have your peers police you is there too. The amount of people I see fretting over whether their army or idea is 'lore accurate' is depressing AF, and even more so the people who trash other people's creativity because they don't consider it 'lore accurate'.

There was a time that 'anything you can imagine' was 40k 'lore accurate'. These days unless you're working from a GW sanctioned book or model, it's greeted with suspicion by the average player. People point to personal freedom to be as creative as you want but ignore that you require a welcoming community to do that. Anyone can technically learn anything, but it's a lot easier if your community supports it and is positive about it. In practice we like to go with the crowd and GW"s careful locking down of their ecosystem means that the crowd have become much more passive consumers than active creators.


It will be interesting to see if these character creation rules are a flash in the pan, or if it signals their return to that aspect of 40k. The current fiction focusing on individual characters doesn't bode well for that, because 40k now only turns on their actions, shrinking it down from the endless possibilities to the individual actions of a half dozen protagonists.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

And I strongly disagree. Inspiring Leader definitely should NOT be readily available. It is way too mechanic breaking. Multiple people have told you that rule - not the super fists - is the reason people take him. This ability is all three doctrines (from Gladius/Blade of Ultramar) turned on all game long for one unit. You can't stack doctrines in the Dets, and you can't (usually) apply one here and one there. its one doctrine at a time, for the entire army, for one turn. Gladius also doesn't allow you to reuse Doctrines, while Blade does but ONLY if you're taking Calgar. (which I disagree with here). There is also the Bastion Det, which gives the Super Doctrine Combo (and a second boost to advance/fallback and ACTION MONKEY) but only to BATTLELINE units. They are working very hard to keep this off of multiple "elite" units. Terminators, Aggressors, Centurions and such. (which is too bad, it might actually fix Assault Centurions - though they can't get a LEADER so they can't get it FROM a LEADER either) - I wouldn't want to see four LEADERS all with Super Duper Doctrine Always on leading four units of Terminators. Its too potent and to uninteractive.

So make Inspiring Leader only available to one-model-per-army, but make it a generic upgrade that any Chapter Master can take at a hefty cost. I don't see anything game breaking in that.

It probably shouldn't be for every chapter (master). Doctrines are/were primarily a UM thing. Even the Det that lets you double and triple up on Doctrines is a UM only upgrade to the Generic but Thematic Dets available to all (Think Forgefather's Seekers and Firestorm Assault Force). (and wrongly requires Calgar like Seekers wrongly requires He'stan) I suspect the Bastion Det that gives the super duper doctrine but only BATTLELINE is an experiment in Beta Test trying to make BATTLELINE more attractive. Doctrines started as UM only - again I'm guessing as a Beta Test experiment because - they then rolled out to all chapters, but UM were then given a double-up to maintain their "doctrine expertise". The Double-Triple Doctrine Det is UM only. The Ravenwing generic Det was "You can't shoot me" while their doubledown RG only Det added their Strike and Fade stuff. I don't know what they think they're doing with Imperial Fists and Iron Warriors. Maybe they don't either. Reclaimation Force looks like trying to bring Space Marine 2 to the table top.

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

Trying to use your personal head cannon to claim that they're not is an impressive level of gymnastics.

I didn't see anything that was personal headcannon. A Chapter Master is fundamentally just a guy with rank A Phoenix Lord is a sort of immortal demon armor that posesses the wearer. There may have been hundreds of thousands of Chapter Masters since the OG foundings. The Phoenix Lords have been the same entities for millenia, reborn time and again. Phoenix Lords are more akin to Primarchs of their respective shrines in terms of "history", and more like Lucius the Eternal in manifestation.

The Avatar is more akin to a Primarch. Phoenix Lords are more akin to Captains and Chapter Masters.

Based on what metric? Primarchs are singular beings, and their respective millenia-old founding chapters' preferences and philosophies reflect that. Phoenix Lords are singular beings, and their millenia-old respective founding Aspects preferences and philosophies reflect that.

Exarchs, are leaders of their respective shrines and come and go as Chapter Masters do. Primarchs and Phoenix Lords are the same beings/entities they were 10,000 years ago, even if evolved or transformed.

Avatar of Khaine’s stats are closer to a Primarch than a Phoenix Lord.
But their spot in the lore (which is very much relevant to what the gameplay should be, if not one to one) is vastly different, closer to a Chapter Master than a Primarch.

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

And I strongly disagree. Inspiring Leader definitely should NOT be readily available. It is way too mechanic breaking. Multiple people have told you that rule - not the super fists - is the reason people take him. This ability is all three doctrines (from Gladius/Blade of Ultramar) turned on all game long for one unit. You can't stack doctrines in the Dets, and you can't (usually) apply one here and one there. its one doctrine at a time, for the entire army, for one turn. Gladius also doesn't allow you to reuse Doctrines, while Blade does but ONLY if you're taking Calgar. (which I disagree with here). There is also the Bastion Det, which gives the Super Doctrine Combo (and a second boost to advance/fallback and ACTION MONKEY) but only to BATTLELINE units. They are working very hard to keep this off of multiple "elite" units. Terminators, Aggressors, Centurions and such. (which is too bad, it might actually fix Assault Centurions - though they can't get a LEADER so they can't get it FROM a LEADER either) - I wouldn't want to see four LEADERS all with Super Duper Doctrine Always on leading four units of Terminators. Its too potent and to uninteractive.

So make Inspiring Leader only available to one-model-per-army, but make it a generic upgrade that any Chapter Master can take at a hefty cost. I don't see anything game breaking in that.

It probably shouldn't be for every chapter (master). Doctrines are/were primarily a UM thing. Even the Det that lets you double and triple up on Doctrines is a UM only upgrade to the Generic but Thematic Dets available to all (Think Forgefather's Seekers and Firestorm Assault Force). (and wrongly requires Calgar like Seekers wrongly requires He'stan) I suspect the Bastion Det that gives the super duper doctrine but only BATTLELINE is an experiment in Beta Test trying to make BATTLELINE more attractive. Doctrines started as UM only - again I'm guessing as a Beta Test experiment because - they then rolled out to all chapters, but UM were then given a double-up to maintain their "doctrine expertise". The Double-Triple Doctrine Det is UM only. The Ravenwing generic Det was "You can't shoot me" while their doubledown RG only Det added their Strike and Fade stuff. I don't know what they think they're doing with Imperial Fists and Iron Warriors. Maybe they don't either. Reclaimation Force looks like trying to bring Space Marine 2 to the table top.

But likewise why limit Doctrrne specialty to UM only? Why not go the route of opening up the option to other codex chapters?



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Avatar of Khaine’s stats are closer to a Primarch than a Phoenix Lord.
But their spot in the lore (which is very much relevant to what the gameplay should be, if not one to one) is vastly different, closer to a Chapter Master than a Primarch.

Right. One Avatar per Craftworld. And there are hundreds (thousands?) Of Craftworlds.

There are far more Avatars than there are Phoenix Lords.

 vipoid wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:
While I generally like the idea of the more sandbox elements of the setting, I'll admit that it never drew me the way the characters of Space Marine and DoW did and I think that's ultimately why things are the way they are now. As much as we all like the idea of creating our own characters, the overwhelming majority is more drawn to learning about characters the setting has created for them.

I think, for all its merits, character creation doesn't have that broad of appeal, particularly for newcomers with almost no way of properly grasping the world they're trying to create a character for. There are definitely people who come in with that mindset off the start, but for a lot of people its more of a barrier in a hobby that already has a lot of them.

That said, I think having a lot of aesthetic options on character kits is a huge plus and something I'd like to see more of. I just think that works better to get people invested in creating their own characters when you don't put much in the way of rules behind them. Creating a bunch of head options is great and weapon options too as long as they're of the "power weapon" variety. Put the rules on them and people actually get less invested in designing the character their way when their way is "bad" in gameplay.

IDK. Getting rambly. TLDR. I think generic characters are cool and would help a lot from having more head options. I think there's a reason that named characters keep getting focus though and I suspect its because custom characters just don't have as broad appeal

I think it's fair to query how much of this is down to how GW sells elements of the game.

Anyone remember GW's old website? There were pages where designers would show off their armies and how they'd made custom characters to lead them.

Now everything is just focused on what you can buy from the GW webstore.

Likewise, you cite games where you play as defined characters, yet surely that only highlights the point that even the video-games promote the use of pre-made characters, rather than letting players make and play as their own Space Marine characters?

I'm reminded of the old adage that Space Marines need to get more support because they're the most popular faction. Yet this theory never seems to consider that the fact that SMs may in fact be related to them getting near-constant releases, on top of being the poster-boys, the main protagonists of virtually all the fiction, the faction that's included in all the starter sets etc.

By the same measure, it doesn't seem unreasonable to speculate that GW's constant promotion of pre-made characters and off-the-shelf models might actually play a role in newer customers not valuing customisation and 'your dudes' as much as the players of old.

I'm not sure it was marketing some aspects of the game or anything to do with their website. People were using Special characters back then too.

I think the issue caused the new design system and is two-fold:

1) They don't trust the players to do it. As mentioned earlier, you used to select a Captain (or a whatever) and then you could pick power armor, Terminator Armor, Bike, etc. Which then required you to modify the stat bar. Today with Terminator Armor you'd have to -1 Movement, +1 Armor Save, and +1W. They don't trust the players to do that accurately anymore.

2) They don't want the players to keep "breaking" the game. It still happens when we can't sit there and mix and match 2 or more out of a pool of 20-30 Enhancements on generic characters - how much worse would it be if we could? Imagine a Terminator Captain leading a squad of Terminators who get to Fallback, Advance, Charge, Shoot yadda yadda all day long (Inspiring Leader). Now imagine when they advance and charge they also add 1 to each/both rolls. (Grandmaster of the Ravenwing) How about Champion of the King's Guard (Arjac) and Oathbound(Ulrik) from the Space Wolves? I'm now making a 10 man Terminator Squad Plus a Terminator Captain who gives them both of those, and a Terminator Ancient that gives them the Trifold Path of Shadow from Shrike That unit now adds 1 to Hit and Wound, and Rerolls all hits and wounds vs a type keyword? and can't be shot from outside 12". And I still have a slot open on the Ancient for Inspiring Leader from Calgar. We SHOULD be able to apply multiple small to middling "enhancements" to every character to make them both typical of their type and distinctly different from each other. But those pre-chosen bespokes on the nameds need to be carefully screened for inclusion. They made sure you can't double up with those two Wolves bespoke enhancements based on who each character could join. I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge OR Lead from the Front off of Sicarius.

The space required for a create-your-own LEADER system that is deep enough to satisfy is huge. They should still do it. But we're in an edition after people complained about "bloat", so I wouldn't expect it soon.

Breton wrote:
I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge OR Lead from the Front off of Sicarius.

I hate to tell you this, but you currently can stack Calgar AND Sicarius in the same unit. That's totally legal.

Breton wrote:

The space required for a create-your-own LEADER system that is deep enough to satisfy is huge. They should still do it. But we're in an edition after people complained about "bloat", so I wouldn't expect it soon.

Some might say that one unit entry with a selection of (often shared) options is less bloated than 20 datasheets each with minor variations.

 Insectum7 wrote:
But likewise why limit Doctrrne specialty to UM only? Why not go the route of opening up the option to other codex chapters?

Why limit Phoenix Lords to Aeldari? Why not open them up to all the other xenos? Or everyone everywhere? Why not let Black Templar have librarians? Wouldn't Calgar make a better Master of the Deathwing than Belial? That's how they create variety. If they give Doctrines to Blood Angels do they have to remove the Death Company? Death Company Captains? Blood Angels Captains? Sanguinary Priests? One of the things people like to do is reduce (Loyalist) Space Marines all to one blob. They're not. They're 8+ different armies. Most of them will come from a specfic and more supported five but five is still four more than one.

Breton wrote:
Bespoke datasheets with the Epic Hero keyword are literally what makes them Epic Heroes. You want to keep YOUR Bespoke Datasheets and get rid of all the bespoke datasheets for Space Marines even though without the name and very minor variations - a point of movement, a point of toughness, a point of armor save give or take and so on depending on the Aspect and the Captain - you can't tell the difference between them. Oh except maybe one or two Space Marine Primarchs. I have represented you entirely correctly.

Are you under the impression that the handful of examples I gave earlier were meant to be a comprehensive list? I'm sure there are more space marine named characters than just the primarchs who are weird/rare enough in nature to warrant their own bespoke datasheets. I'm sure there are more eldar characters than just Eldrad who have bespoke datasheets and don't need them.

My understanding from your response is that you were saying:
* The distinction between a named character like calgar and a generic character like steve is essentially just that the Epic Hero rule means you can only have one of the Calgar datasheets in your army but multiples of the Steve datasheets in your army.
* You then seem to be stating that designing Steve to be as strong as Calgar would be imbalanced because you could have three of him whereas having only one Calgar means that it's fine for him to be a little overtuned for his points because you can only take one of him? So you're essentially saying that being 0-1 should be used as a balancing factor for a unit being designed or costed less well than it could have been?
* You also seem to be suggesting that every faction should have some number of these overtuned 0-1 units as a way of balancing factions against eachother.

Is my understanding there incorrect? If not, I think my points were valid. I'm basically arguing that a 0-1 limitation shouldn't be used as a way to balance undercosted units. Instead, Calgar's capabilities should be options for generic captains, and they should be designed in such a way that they don't break the game.
EDIT: Wanted to clarify on this point. 0-1 could be a reasonable limitation for gimmicks or mechanics that are fine when you have one instance of them but problematic if you have multiples. The distinction here being that there's something about the character's mechanics that makes them a problem when taken in multiples; *not* just that the unit does too much damage or is undercosted for what it does. Off the top of my head, maybe one Maugan Ra sprinkling mortal wounds around with his special rule is fine because it's just a bit of chip damage here and there, but three Maugans would be a problem because you're increasing the odds of finishing off units with the sprinkled-on mortal wounds or potentially piling up lots of mortal wounds on a high toughness/good saves target rather than just doing a bit of chip damage to help the rest of your army along.

So you wanted to clarify YOU think it could be for limiting out-of-scope abilities, but you didn't clarify that maybe that's what I thought to? Yeah, its different when you do it. The Ultramarines used to have what was or would have been an epic hero named Antaro Chronus. He was decidedly UN-Powerful. He still should have been an Epic Hero.

If you were trying to make the same point that I did in the "EDIT" portion of that post, it wasn't clear to me based on what you wrote. The relevant section being this:

Its not the name, its the rule(s) itself. EPIC HERO. And no I don't literally mean its an epic hero. I mean the rules for EPIC HERO - in the first place mean everyone needs to get some for balance - and for another says GW Made the guy, and they made the guy to be one and only one. Even if you could still make Chapter Master Steve Angryfire, he would not be an Epic Hero, and you can have three of him. But you can't have three of Calgar. That's not the reason Calgar should be stronger, its the reason Steve should not be that strong which in this case ends up the same, but is different.

I tried to ask you if I was correctly understanding what you were trying to say in the text you quoted. Rather than confirming whether or not we were on the same page, you've instead chosen to assume that I'm... what? Out to get you?

If you agree that 0-1 can be a limitation for mechanics that by their nature would be a problem if armies could take multiples of them, then hey! Common ground! Good deal.
If you're instead saying that all armies should basically just have some number of undercosted units that are then "balanced" by a 0-1 restriction, I disagree with you.

* Honor Guard of Macragge: He gets feel no pain wihle he's attached to a squad of honor guard. Other captains could probably have body guards that are especially good at keeping their bosses from getting sniped out.

You're getting Honor Guard of Macragge very wrong. He gets the FNP when the two Victrix Guard are still alive not the entire bodyguard. That rule is there to let the Bodyguard he comes with at least try to prevent PRECISION.

While this unit contains one or more Victrix Honour Guard models, this unit’s MARNEUS CALGAR model has the Feel No Pain Yadda Yadda

I was under the impression that the honor guard were the entirety of the unit rather than just models that could join another unit. My bad. Although the point I was making still stands. This is essentially a rule that lets a VIP's protectors protect him from getting sniped by giving Calgar FNP. There's nothing about Calgar that makes him the only marine in the galaxy capable of being protected from snipers (and other precision attacks) by his personal guards.

Just to be clear because your phrasing in the above quote was a little ambiguous, we're both on the same page that I was saying this rule just gave Calgar FNP, right? I wasn't saying that the entire unit he's attached to gets FNP.

Did you get this so extremely wrong on purpose or in "good faith"?

You're making a lot of personal attacks in this thread, so I thought it might be good to clarify exactly what you're suggesting here. Hypothetically, in this scenario where I'm intentionally going out of my way to get a rule slightly wrong, what's my goal? Are you picturing me crouched over a keyboard plotting out ways to like, ruin your life by suggesting some named character datasheets become generic options instead? Walk me through that scenario, Breton. What kind of villainous antics am I up to?

And I strongly disagree. Inspiring Leader definitely should NOT be readily available. It is way too mechanic breaking

Cool. Fair enough. Then as Insectum suggested, make it a 0-1 upgrade option for generic characters. And chiming in on your follow-up conversation with Insectum:

It probably shouldn't be for every chapter (master). Doctrines are/were primarily a UM thing.

There's a genuine argument to be made here about wanting to protect niches and faction personality. I can definitely recognize that. Hey! More common ground!

Now that said, I'd be tempted to look at a rule like this not asa *doctrine* thing but as a general mobility thing. Plenty of armies have access to a similar rule to this either as a strat, a character ability, or whatever. Generally, it just reflects the unit being "slippery" and "mobile." So I think there's a case to be made for letting a generic character do something similar. A white scar bike captain smashing his way from what combat to another without stopping would be pretty well represented by this rule. So would a raven guard captain commanding his squad to break away from the chaff so they can focus on attacking a priority target.

Trying to set aside as many variables as possible for the sake of finding more common ground, would you at laest agree that a generic UM captain could reasonably have this ability if it were limited to being a 0-1 option? At that point, it's 0-1 so no worries about it being too strong when taken by multipel units. It's UM, so no worries about wanting a doctrine-like rule to be limited to the doctrine chapter. The only difference at that point is that it's not specifically locked to the datasheet of a power fist guy who also hangs out with his honor guard.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Breton wrote:
I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge OR Lead from the Front off of Sicarius.

I hate to tell you this, but you currently can stack Calgar AND Sicarius in the same unit. That's totally legal.

That's a different version - the ability to join with Calgar is only present on that one of his datasheets (not both, and not on the Victrix unit itself), so while you can join the earlier Sicarius to Victrix units, you can't join the earlier one AND Calgar - and the while the newer one still has Knight Champion he does not have Lead from the Front anymore. And you can only do it in the one unit that's kinda meh - especially as a bodyguard unit for Calgar to buff - compared to what you COULD do it with if it was a free-for-all. But my bad for not specifying that. I was imagining 10 Tactical Terminators with 2 Cyclones getting Advance(and more) and Shoot and Charge, Scout 6", and the Near but Not That Near move. Calgar buffs their movement enough already.

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
But likewise why limit Doctrrne specialty to UM only? Why not go the route of opening up the option to other codex chapters?

Why limit Phoenix Lords to Aeldari? Why not open them up to all the other xenos? Or everyone everywhere? Why not let Black Templar have librarians? Wouldn't Calgar make a better Master of the Deathwing than Belial? That's how they create variety. If they give Doctrines to Blood Angels do they have to remove the Death Company? Death Company Captains? Blood Angels Captains? Sanguinary Priests? One of the things people like to do is reduce (Loyalist) Space Marines all to one blob. They're not. They're 8+ different armies. Most of them will come from a specfic and more supported five but five is still four more than one.

Poor analogy. They've already done this sort of thing back in 4th edition, when you could create custom chapters from a set of traits, and named chapters just had prescribed but non-unique traits. UM are a codex chapter, like most chapters, and among those chapters many are very adherent. UM don't have to be special in this regard. Just like you'd traditionally use the BA codex to create a BA successor.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Avatar of Khaine’s stats are closer to a Primarch than a Phoenix Lord.
But their spot in the lore (which is very much relevant to what the gameplay should be, if not one to one) is vastly different, closer to a Chapter Master than a Primarch.

Which are you referring to?

Each aspect shrine is a different organisation. There could be a half dozen shrines of the same aspect on a craftworld and each is led by different exarchs that teach differently. They're all independent. When an exarch sets up a new shrine, they give it a new name and teach in their own way. Each one is like a successor chapter. When a phoenix lord shows up, they all bow to them regardless. So In that respect, they are more like a primarch, able to command any one of their aspect's shrines regardless. Just as no primarch can demand fealty from their brothers' marines, no phoenix lord commands the other aspects, excepting perhaps Asurmen as the founder of the path of the warrior in general (which arguably is how Roboute currently works).

Phoenix lords are also wanderers, they have no home base and wander the galaxy fighting by themselves. Only in fated events where they appear at a craftworld do they command their shrines. 90% of their actions are performed solo, which is unlike a chapter master or a primarch (except maybe corax and leman russ currently).

Culturally, they sit outside and above eldar society. Militarily they occupy an independent high position where everyone will listen to and follow them should they appear, just as the Lion showing up at a battlefield would have all imperial soldiers doing what he asked.

Physically, they are unlike any other eldar and no one can just become them. Exarchs are the closest physically to them, but even they aren't the same. They exist in a state not dissimilar to an avatar of khaine - when an individual is sacrificed to their suit/statue, they are resurrected. When they are damaged they go inactive, waiting for another sacrifice to bring them back to life.


EDIT: in the hypothetical reduction of bespoke special character profiles, I'd probably have a generic Primarch and generic phoenix Lord profile, and you represent them by the equipment and special rules they are given.

Back when FW first introduced primarchs they had clearly a single profile they tweaked. their core stats were some variation on WS7 BS6 S6 T6 W6 I6 A6 Ld10 Sv2+ (from the HH black books, this is guilliman, all the other primarchs went up or sometimes down on this). During that era, the phoenix lord stats worked similarly, with a profile that was tweaked for each one. In 7th ed 40k, around the time of the HH black books, they used variations on WS7 BS7 S4 T4 W3 I7 A4 Ld10 Sv2+.

They both still basically have a default profile - no eldar character has the same profile as a phoenix lord, except other phoenix lords (Drazhar as well). Lion and guilliman both look pretty similar.


So you'd go 0-1 of a primarch or PL unit, and you still get to build them to a degree. Stronger more attacks for Russ, tougher for Fuegan, battlefate for Asurmen.


For Special character autarchs and captains or chapter masters, they'd just be an interesting configuration of weapons and rules.


The new character builder sounds quite in depth so maybe that's the kind of thing we'll see.

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Breton wrote:
I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge OR Lead from the Front off of Sicarius.

I hate to tell you this, but you currently can stack Calgar AND Sicarius in the same unit. That's totally legal.

That's a different version - the ability to join with Calgar is only present on that one of his datasheets (not both, and not on the Victrix unit itself), so while you can join the earlier Sicarius to Victrix units, you can't join the earlier one AND Calgar - and the while the newer one still has Knight Champion he does not have Lead from the Front anymore.

That still doesn't change what you said.

You said that you didn't want Calgar's Inspiring Leader stacking with Sicarius' Knight Champion of Macragge. It does, and can. The Victrix Guard can be joined by both Cato Sicarius (not Captain!) and Calgar, and benefit from Advance and Charge, Reactive Move within 9" of the UNIT (not even within 9" of just Sicarius, like his Captain Sicarius Lightning Assault ability does), and free Heroic Intervention.
But yeah, them losing Scout 6" and Assault really makes all the difference, and definitely isn't made up for by a better Reactive Move, free Heroic Intervention, and a MUCH beefier melee profile. /s

And you can only do it in the one unit that's kinda meh - especially as a bodyguard unit for Calgar to buff - compared to what you COULD do it with if it was a free-for-all. But my bad for not specifying that.

No, you're just plain wrong on what you claimed. You said "I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge" - the "or Lead from the Front" doesn't change the first part of the sentence, nor does it even make much sense, given that Lead from the Front isn't nearly as busted as the other abilities that Cato Sicarius has opposed to Captain Sicarius, and especially on Victrix Guard.

You were just plain incorrect. And it's okay to be wrong, but there's no sense in denying it.

I was imagining 10 Tactical Terminators with 2 Cyclones getting Advance(and more) and Shoot and Charge, Scout 6", and the Near but Not That Near move. Calgar buffs their movement enough already.

I hate to also tell you this, but 10 Terminators can also already do that, minus Scout, even without Calgar! Stormlance Task Force, Blitzing Fusillade and Windswift Evasion as needed, and you could still stick Calgar in to auto-generate the extra CP for Windswift Evasion, and cut out even needing Blitzing Fusillade. Or, if you aren't going to be spending those command points anywhere else, just take a Librarian and give them Sustained Hits, or a Chaplain, for +1 Wound, on top of an Enhancement.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Breton wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
But likewise why limit Doctrrne specialty to UM only? Why not go the route of opening up the option to other codex chapters?

Why limit Phoenix Lords to Aeldari? Why not open them up to all the other xenos? Or everyone everywhere?

Because they're Aeldari Phoenix Lords, not Ultramarines Phoenix Lords? What sort of nonsense is this?

Why not let Black Templar have librarians?

Because that's the narrative flavour of them - not a gameplay balance consideration to "create variety".

If they give Doctrines to Blood Angels do they have to remove the Death Company? Death Company Captains? Blood Angels Captains? Sanguinary Priests?

You literally can take all of those Blood Angels units and still have Doctrines. Just take Gladius Task Force.

Also, does this imply that it's not a Blood Angels army if you don't take those specific units? What about my Blood Angels army - I don't use any BA specific units in it. Are they now not BA, because I didn't bring a named BA unit?

I should also mention, many BA successors in the lore (and even successors of "non-Codex" Chapters) follow the Codex, and in many cases, even more doggedly than UM successors. The Absolvers spring to mind.

EDIT: in the hypothetical reduction of bespoke special character profiles, I'd probably have a generic Primarch and generic phoenix Lord profile, and you represent them by the equipment and special rules they are given.

Part of the reason I'm a little on the fence about phoenix lords (and would probably prefer bespoke profiles for primarchs) is that we already have a pretty good idea of what most of them are supposed to be like. So you may end up with weird combinations. For instance, there would presumably be some kind of sneaky upgrade intended to represent Corax or Alpharius, but players could theoretically slap that on Dorn or Ferrus instead. Which feels weird, but maybe I'm just yucking their yum at that point. Dorn is allowed to be sneaky from time to time.

Similarly, it would be odd if a phoenix lord that was meant to represent Fuegan was rocking a shuriken cannon and wings instead of a melta weapon and an axe. So I can see the case for locking in the loadouts of the phoenix lords. I guess the question would be whether jump pack shuriken cannon Fuegan would be more of a bug or a feature.

To my mind, the point of a generic phoenix lord profile would be to allow people to come up with their own lords. But then you'd have a lord an no aspect warriors to stick them with unless you're letting Kris-tahl, the founder of the Crystal Dragons to join squads of Striking Scorpions or whatever.

Edit: Although if you had a different exarch datasheet for each aspect, you'd probably be fine. A dragon exarch that takes both a fire axe and fire pike would be pretty Fuegan-shaped. This is, of course, assuming that we're talking about a version of phoenix lords that downplays their inconsistent skill level as sufficiently exarch-like and opt not to lean into the resurrection thing or their weird magic stuff. If you want the "demigod version" of phoenix lords, a generic profile seems a little wonky for the reasons described above.

If you can reasonably make rules for every single member of a class of unit, I think they’re fine being bespoke.

Primarchs have 16, at most, for 40k. You can make 16 datasheets.
Phoenix Lords have less than a dozen. You can definitely have a datasheet for each one.

There’s around four digits worth of Chapter Masters. You could technically make a sheet for each of them, but that’s wildly impractical.

One thing I liked about the HH primarchs early on was they had a range of weapons they could use. I like that they aren't forced to stay with the same weapon combo. They had arsenals available to them.

Similarly, phoenix lords must know how to use their aspect equipment, or it would be odd they taught them how to use weapons they themselves can't.


I'm not particularly fussed about it. Just thinking about simplifications.

If you go all the way back to 3rd ed, the phoenix lords carried generic statted exarch weapons, the power was in their profile using those weapons. The Early HH rules favoured simple weapon profiles for primarchs until they bloated out to the bespoke ones everyone has now.

IMO, in most cases, a power fist is a power fist. A dire sword is a dire sword. It seems unnecessary for them to have different levels. Maybe master crafting, but they don't need unique stats.

so when you select gear for them, you're just picking from the wargear options and their stats are what distinguishes them rather than their weapons.

 Wyldhunt wrote:


If you agree that 0-1 can be a limitation for mechanics that by their nature would be a problem if armies could take multiples of them, then hey! Common ground! Good deal.
If you're instead saying that all armies should basically just have some number of undercosted units that are then "balanced" by a 0-1 restriction, I disagree with you.

I disagree with the premise that named characters are automatically undercosted. Belial is actually cheaper than the generic Terminator Captain. And worse.
The basic power armor captain is X number of Points.
Original Sicarius is X+5 and probably undercosted.
New Sicarius is X+15 and lost a bunch of what he had, got a new Rites of Battle-esque ability that can now be used, So I'd say he is probably now being costed closer to if not correctly
Ventris is also X+15 and about right.

A Gravis Captain is Y points.
Calgar in Gravis Armor is Y + 120 points. About half of that is explained by two Bladeguard bodyguards. Two enhancements the Chapter Master stat upgrades and some boosted wargear for 60 points doesn't feel undercosted.

A Terminator Captain is Z points.
Terminator Calgar (with the exact same stats and gear just without the two extra models and their bespoke rule) is Y+60 and Z+45 leading me to believe the cost problem with Calgar - if there is one - is in the Terminator Captain or the Aggressor Captain.

* Honor Guard of Macragge: He gets feel no pain wihle he's attached to a squad of honor guard. Other captains could probably have body guards that are especially good at keeping their bosses from getting sniped out.

You're getting Honor Guard of Macragge very wrong. He gets the FNP when the two Victrix Guard are still alive not the entire bodyguard. That rule is there to let the Bodyguard he comes with at least try to prevent PRECISION.

While this unit contains one or more Victrix Honour Guard models, this unit’s MARNEUS CALGAR model has the Feel No Pain Yadda Yadda

I was under the impression that the honor guard were the entirety of the unit rather than just models that could join another unit. My bad. Although the point I was making still stands. This is essentially a rule that lets a VIP's protectors protect him from getting sniped by giving Calgar FNP. There's nothing about Calgar that makes him the only marine in the galaxy capable of being protected from snipers (and other precision attacks) by his personal guards.

Just to be clear because your phrasing in the above quote was a little ambiguous, we're both on the same page that I was saying this rule just gave Calgar FNP, right? I wasn't saying that the entire unit he's attached to gets FNP.

Yes, I didn't think you meant the entire unit got FNP, I think you were incorrectly describing the ability as requiring the opponent to chew through 30 or more T6ish wounds of Bodyguard to get rid of the FNP. I also think you're incorrect for trying to claim this rule was about Calgar. Terminator Calgar does not have this rule. This rule was about the two bodyguards. When they went away because he switched to Terminator Armor, the rule went away.

Did you get this so extremely wrong on purpose or in "good faith"?

You're making a lot of personal attacks in this thread, so I thought it might be good to clarify exactly what you're suggesting here. Hypothetically, in this scenario where I'm intentionally going out of my way to get a rule slightly wrong, what's my goal? Are you picturing me crouched over a keyboard plotting out ways to like, ruin your life by suggesting some named character datasheets become generic options instead? Walk me through that scenario, Breton. What kind of villainous antics am I up to?

I asked a question. Like you do when you ask if I'm trolling or in good faith. If you thought it was a personal attack, why did you do it?

And I strongly disagree. Inspiring Leader definitely should NOT be readily available. It is way too mechanic breaking

Cool. Fair enough. Then as Insectum suggested, make it a 0-1 upgrade option for generic characters. And chiming in on your follow-up conversation with Insectum:

It probably shouldn't be for every chapter (master). Doctrines are/were primarily a UM thing.

There's a genuine argument to be made here about wanting to protect niches and faction personality. I can definitely recognize that. Hey! More common ground!

Now that said, I'd be tempted to look at a rule like this not asa *doctrine* thing but as a general mobility thing. Plenty of armies have access to a similar rule to this either as a strat, a character ability, or whatever.

No, they (generally) don't. They have access to PART of the rule. I JUST finished explaining this. They have some PART of this ability but not the whole thing. Firestorm gives you Assault which lets you advance and shoot. But not Fall back and Shoot. Stormlance lets you charge after an advance or a fallback - the Hit and Run rule from earlier White Scars identity. As I just said, The only place Marines can get this sort of rule outside of Calgar is in the Bastion Det and I suspect that's a testbed for improving BATTLELINE units.

Generally, it just reflects the unit being "slippery" and "mobile." So I think there's a case to be made for letting a generic character do something similar. A white scar bike captain smashing his way from what combat to another without stopping would be pretty well represented by this rule. So would a raven guard captain commanding his squad to break away from the chaff so they can focus on attacking a priority target.

Trying to set aside as many variables as possible for the sake of finding more common ground, would you at laest agree that a generic UM captain could reasonably have this ability if it were limited to being a 0-1 option? At that point, it's 0-1 so no worries about it being too strong when taken by multipel units. It's UM, so no worries about wanting a doctrine-like rule to be limited to the doctrine chapter. The only difference at that point is that it's not specifically locked to the datasheet of a power fist guy who also hangs out with his honor guard.

To be honest, no. I can and repeatedly have agreed with the general concept - that most bespokes should be part of a generic character builder - but in this particular case no this particular one I wouldn't turn it loose on the public - especially in a system that allows you to stack two bespokes/enhancements to build the generically bespoke nameds. And doubly so in a system that lets you attach two characters that could theoretically stack FOUR Enhance/Bespokes. I think that would easily create a multitude of Aggressor Bomb stackings.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JNAProductions wrote:
If you can reasonably make rules for every single member of a class of unit, I think they’re fine being bespoke.

Primarchs have 16, at most, for 40k. You can make 16 datasheets.
Phoenix Lords have less than a dozen. You can definitely have a datasheet for each one.

There’s around four digits worth of Chapter Masters. You could technically make a sheet for each of them, but that’s wildly impractical.

They definitely shouldn't even try. Those chapters aren't theirs to do it with. I mean sure they put the names and color schemes of what? 50? 60? of them in a Space Marine Codex, but they've put almost no fluff out there for them. Those are the player's chapters. And that's even before the truly DIY chapters. GW should not be making those datasheets. That's what the DIY Character creator should be for. They SHOULD make datasheets for all the chapters (but not necessarily all the characters) they DO "own". The 8 Primogenitors, and a couple of the subsequent foundings (Crimson Fists, Black Templars, Fleshtearers, etc. They should make Chapter Master, Chief Libby, Master of Sanctity, Captain Iconic, Captain Black Sheep, and anything fluffy. They should make generic Chatacter Blister Packs and Chapter Specific Character Upgrade packs. So you they don't have to make a Gregor Dessian model, you just buy the right Armor Base, and use upgrade sprue pieces 7 through 12 which are arms, shoulderpads, a head, and a chest piece or something. They should have one iconic Captain for each chapter - the guy who does it exactly the way that chapter does things (think Suboden) and they should have a Blacksheep Captain (think Sammael but not that Black sheep means biker - Dark Angels are kind of the Terminator Chapter).

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
If you can reasonably make rules for every single member of a class of unit, I think they’re fine being bespoke.

Primarchs have 16, at most, for 40k. You can make 16 datasheets.
Phoenix Lords have less than a dozen. You can definitely have a datasheet for each one.

There’s around four digits worth of Chapter Masters. You could technically make a sheet for each of them, but that’s wildly impractical.

They definitely shouldn't even try. Those chapters aren't theirs to do it with. I mean sure they put the names and color schemes of what? 50? 60? of them in a Space Marine Codex, but they've put almost no fluff out there for them. Those are the player's chapters. And that's even before the truly DIY chapters. GW should not be making those datasheets. That's what the DIY Character creator should be for. They SHOULD make datasheets for all the chapters (but not necessarily all the characters) they DO "own".

But why?

Genuinely, why? If they can trust the players to make the Chapter Masters and Captains for their own Chapters, why not for the Big Chapters? Why do you need GW to make the ENTIRE Chapter Command for those Chapters? Can't GW just say "hey, Chapter Master Biggus Namius can be represented with X abilities, Captain Lessus Importus can be represented with Y, and Chief Librarian Nerdicus should take Z".

If you're concerned about players only picking the "broken" options, then should we not also be concerned by players picking "broken" named characters (ie, Calgars and Ventrises showing up in every Ultramarines army)? Players will, as I'm sure you're aware of, optimise the fluff out of something if they want to. So why does it matter about if they take the most powerful abilities on their custom characters? They're already doing that, via taking the most effective Epic Heroes in the first place.

I genuinely don't get why you believe that GW *should* do this. Why do they NEED to make all these bespoke characters, especially if you're also going to claim that players should be able to make custom heroes themselves, just not specifically from the Big Chapters? What does that add to the game?

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
If you can reasonably make rules for every single member of a class of unit, I think they’re fine being bespoke.

Primarchs have 16, at most, for 40k. You can make 16 datasheets.
Phoenix Lords have less than a dozen. You can definitely have a datasheet for each one.

There’s around four digits worth of Chapter Masters. You could technically make a sheet for each of them, but that’s wildly impractical.

They definitely shouldn't even try. Those chapters aren't theirs to do it with. I mean sure they put the names and color schemes of what? 50? 60? of them in a Space Marine Codex, but they've put almost no fluff out there for them. Those are the player's chapters. And that's even before the truly DIY chapters. GW should not be making those datasheets. That's what the DIY Character creator should be for. They SHOULD make datasheets for all the chapters (but not necessarily all the characters) they DO "own".

But why?

Genuinely, why? If they can trust the players to make the Chapter Masters and Captains for their own Chapters, why not for the Big Chapters? Why do you need GW to make the ENTIRE Chapter Command for those Chapters? Can't GW just say "hey, Chapter Master Biggus Namius can be represented with X abilities, Captain Lessus Importus can be represented with Y, and Chief Librarian Nerdicus should take Z".

Because GW "owns" those Chapters. Players "own" their own chapters. GW has chosen to control some chapters, and thus they should fully support those Chapters they chose.

If you're concerned about players only picking the "broken" options, then should we not also be concerned by players picking "broken" named characters (ie, Calgars and Ventrises showing up in every Ultramarines army)? Players will, as I'm sure you're aware of, optimise the fluff out of something if they want to. So why does it matter about if they take the most powerful abilities on their custom characters? They're already doing that, via taking the most effective Epic Heroes in the first place.

I genuinely don't get why you believe that GW *should* do this. Why do they NEED to make all these bespoke characters, especially if you're also going to claim that players should be able to make custom heroes themselves, just not specifically from the Big Chapters? What does that add to the game?

There are 8 more captains beyond the two I said should be made. I get you don't get it, but I don't get why you don't get it. Those are the Chapters GW made. They should be the ones to fully support and flesh out all of those chapters. They should also create a matrix so people can make their own dudes for their chapters. They shouldn't make the Chapter Command of Chapters they opened up to the players by not doing anything but color scheme or that players made entirely themselves. This isn't contradictory.

And why is “Here’s a datasheet to represent Calgar and no one else,” better than “Here’s a datasheet that, with upgrades ABC, represents Calgar.”?

Edit: I will also note that at no point have I called for people to be unable to field Calgar-mini or rules.

 JNAProductions wrote:
And why is “Here’s a datasheet to represent Calgar and no one else,” better than “Here’s a datasheet that, with upgrades ABC, represents Calgar.”?

Edit: I will also note that at no point have I called for people to be unable to field Calgar-mini or rules.

As I just mentioned Upgrade A (the Inspiring Leader movement Super Doctrines) should be locked down. Hard. Further Upgrade B, being the Gauntlets of Ultramar should be Calgar only. What is the difference between a Calgar datasheet, and a datasheet that represents Calgar already making all the decisions for you and representing Tor Garaddon already making all the decisions for you, in addition to now making the datasheet 2 pages long?

Because there should be customization. The ability to mechanically express a variety of characters, from GW’s creations to your own. Something that is currently lacking.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Because there should be customization. The ability to mechanically express a variety of characters, from GW’s creations to your own. Something that is currently lacking.

How does a datasheet that makes Calgar with Options ABC (and theoretically) Tor Garadon with Options DEF etc allow for customization?

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Because there should be customization. The ability to mechanically express a variety of characters, from GW’s creations to your own. Something that is currently lacking.

How does a datasheet that makes Calgar with Options ABC (and theoretically) Tor Garadon with Options DEF etc allow for customization?

AEF.
BCD.
AFG.

I thought that’d be pretty obvious. It’s not “Here’s one option to make Calgar,” it’s “Calgar is a Captain, upgraded to Chapter Master. He is armed with twin MC Powerfists, and an MC Storm Bolter. He has the Nimble and Tactical upgrades from the Leadership category.”

 JNAProductions wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
Because there should be customization. The ability to mechanically express a variety of characters, from GW’s creations to your own. Something that is currently lacking.

How does a datasheet that makes Calgar with Options ABC (and theoretically) Tor Garadon with Options DEF etc allow for customization?

AEF.
BCD.
AFG.

I thought that’d be pretty obvious. It’s not “Here’s one option to make Calgar,” it’s “Calgar is a Captain, upgraded to Chapter Master. He is armed with twin MC Powerfists, and an MC Storm Bolter. He has the Nimble and Tactical upgrades from the Leadership category.”

One of the problems with that is you just eliminated the Gauntlets of Ultramar. Which means eliminating the Talon of Horus. And Drach’nyen. And Maugetar. And Gnarlrod. And Gorechild. And all the wargear that is in itself a character in the world.

No. It doesn’t.

The Gauntlets of Ultramar would still exist. They would be represented by twin MC Powerfists and the MC Storm Bolter.

 JNAProductions wrote:
No. It doesn’t.

The Gauntlets of Ultramar would still exist. They would be represented by twin MC Powerfists and the MC Storm Bolter.

That's the point I just made. Its not the Gauntlets of Ultramar. Its a hum drum pair of powerfists. Its not the Talon of Horus. Its just a claw. Its not Drach'nyen its just a sword.

It's not a hum drum pair of Powerfists and Storm Bolter. It's a Master Crafted pair of Powerfists and a Master Crafted Storm Bolter combined together by GW and given the name Gauntlets of Ultramar, an example of what players could build themselves. Except my Chapter Master instead chooses a Power Sword, gives it the Master Crafted upgrade, then chooses a Melta Pistol, and I combine them both into a polearm and I call it the Staff of Fire.

 Insectum7 wrote:
It's not a hum drum pair of Powerfists and Storm Bolter. It's a Master Crafted pair of Powerfists and a Master Crafted Storm Bolter combined together by GW and given the name Gauntlets of Ultramar, an example of what players could build themselves. Except my Chapter Master instead chooses a Power Sword, gives it the Master Crafted upgrade, then chooses a Melta Pistol, and I combine them both into a polearm and I call it the Staff of Fire.

No its not. Its a unique set of power fists with an underslung something bolter (Its no longer a storm bolter with the arrival of Aggressors) once worn by Roubute Guilliman himself before being handed down to the Chapter Master of the Ultramarines. At one point, when swarming was a thing, it made it impossible to be swarmed.

The Talon of Horus was originally called the Warmaster's Talon, it was created by Master Adept Urtzi Malevolus, and became a badge of the Warmaster's Office. It was the weapon that killed the Primarch Sanguinius.

There's a difference between these types of weapons and the Talssarian Tempest Blade, or a Diresword, or an Axe of Ultramar

I'm kind of confused what the disconnect going on in this thread is. I feel people are making the argument that a good strong set of customization options would be a fun way to express characters, and that most (not all but most) named characters could then be specific builds of those options to show what exactly you can do. That way Calgar has ABC, Dante has DEF, Shrike has GHI, and Chapter Master So and So has AH while Such and Such has CDG, etc. People are using Space Marines merely because it is the easiest, but at his core Yarrick is a Commissar with a Power Fist, laser eye, and Bolt Pistol (I think I forget the exact gun he carries) with a rule that makes him a bit harder to kill outright (which could be a generic ability that someone can then pick from). Same can be said for a lot of characters.

Here's hoping the new character customization rules are fun. From the warcom articles it feels kind of simplistic but I've seen things that seem bland but them come out really cool later. But for examples of character customization, I mean just look at older 40k, like the 3.5 dexes are always held on a pedestal for a reason, or for modern stuff look at Old World - big character gets 100 points of magical items to customize, small character gets 50 points, also most characters have a few options they can pick of the non magic variety.

 kurhanik wrote:
I'm kind of confused what the disconnect going on in this thread is. I feel people are making the argument that a good strong set of customization options would be a fun way to express characters, and that most (not all but most) named characters could then be specific builds of those options to show what exactly you can do. That way Calgar has ABC, Dante has DEF, Shrike has GHI, and Chapter Master So and So has AH while Such and Such has CDG, etc. People are using Space Marines merely because it is the easiest, but at his core Yarrick is a Commissar with a Power Fist, laser eye, and Bolt Pistol (I think I forget the exact gun he carries) with a rule that makes him a bit harder to kill outright (which could be a generic ability that someone can then pick from). Same can be said for a lot of characters.

Here's hoping the new character customization rules are fun. From the warcom articles it feels kind of simplistic but I've seen things that seem bland but them come out really cool later. But for examples of character customization, I mean just look at older 40k, like the 3.5 dexes are always held on a pedestal for a reason, or for modern stuff look at Old World - big character gets 100 points of magical items to customize, small character gets 50 points, also most characters have a few options they can pick of the non magic variety.

The Disconnect is a combination of the end result goal. Some want to get completely get rid of special characters in and of themselves. Some want to effectively but not outright get rid of special characters. Personally I want to keep the special characters we have (and have GW finish making the ones they should for all of the GW Craftworlds, Chapter+Companies, Septs, Dynasties etc) and have an relatively equal option to make your own for those chapters/companies/septs/craftworlds etc Which means neither "solution" is right the whole time, and we'd have to take some of each.

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
No. It doesn’t.

The Gauntlets of Ultramar would still exist. They would be represented by twin MC Powerfists and the MC Storm Bolter.

That's the point I just made. Its not the Gauntlets of Ultramar. Its a hum drum pair of powerfists. Its not the Talon of Horus. Its just a claw. Its not Drach'nyen its just a sword.

4th edition codex:

The Gauntlets of Ultramar are a pair of master-crafted power fists with built-in bolters that fire with the same weapon profile as a single storm bolter (note that only the power fists count as being master-crafted)

Dudeface wrote:

The Gauntlets of Ultramar are a pair of master-crafted power fists with built-in bolters that fire with the same weapon profile as a single storm bolter (note that only the power fists count as being master-crafted)

Ta daaaa!!!

 Insectum7 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

The Gauntlets of Ultramar are a pair of master-crafted power fists with built-in bolters that fire with the same weapon profile as a single storm bolter (note that only the power fists count as being master-crafted)

Ta daaaa!!!

And to reinforce how pointless this conversation is, the three components of that weapon, power fist, storm bolter and master crafted have all had different rules over the last 35 years despite ostensibly representing the same thing.

Are powerfists
S8 ap-5 dam1 like 2nd or
Sx2 ignore saves strike last like in 3rd or
Sx2 ap2 specialist melee weapon, unwieldy like in 6th or
S? Ap-2 D2 -1 to ws like in 8th

Master crafted in 2nd ed had better range modifiers
In 3ed it was reroll to hit
Now it's extra damage


There is no objective measure for how they should be represented.

For their original appearance they weren't even master crafted. Gw will never settle in a profile because because it takes away their ability to resell you the same game with slightly different rules. If they decide that power fists should make you go last again that will happen and apologists will claim it's the best representation yet. Until they change it back and then THAT version will be the best.

Two chapter masters armed with a pair of powet fists in 40k don't have enough differences to need bespoke weapon profiles

IIRC 'Master Crafted' became a modifier for wargear later, and before you just had 'Master Crafted Bolt Pistol' and their ilk as their own wargear cards with their own unique profiles.

Breton wrote:

2) They don't want the players to keep "breaking" the game. It still happens when we can't sit there and mix and match 2 or more out of a pool of 20-30 Enhancements on generic characters - how much worse would it be if we could? Imagine a Terminator Captain leading a squad of Terminators who get to Fallback, Advance, Charge, Shoot yadda yadda all day long (Inspiring Leader). Now imagine when they advance and charge they also add 1 to each/both rolls. (Grandmaster of the Ravenwing) How about Champion of the King's Guard (Arjac) and Oathbound(Ulrik) from the Space Wolves? I'm now making a 10 man Terminator Squad Plus a Terminator Captain who gives them both of those, and a Terminator Ancient that gives them the Trifold Path of Shadow from Shrike That unit now adds 1 to Hit and Wound, and Rerolls all hits and wounds vs a type keyword? and can't be shot from outside 12". And I still have a slot open on the Ancient for Inspiring Leader from Calgar. We SHOULD be able to apply multiple small to middling "enhancements" to every character to make them both typical of their type and distinctly different from each other. But those pre-chosen bespokes on the nameds need to be carefully screened for inclusion. They made sure you can't double up with those two Wolves bespoke enhancements based on who each character could join. I would not want to see Inspiring Leader from Calgar stacked on top of Knight Champion of Macragge OR Lead from the Front off of Sicarius.

I find this a puzzling argument because there are plenty of ways to mitigate this sort of thing. To name a few:

- Artefacts & Warlord Traits (as distinct from 'regular' wargear) were both 1 per model and 1 (of each type) per army. This means you can't just stack half a dozen artefacts onto a single model to create Godking Buffzilla. Nor can you have multiple of the same bonuses in your army.

This would, incidentally, also be a good way to represent the defining aspects of many special characters without needing to have unique dataslates for them. Rather than making their specific dataslate unique, you would instead make their key components (weapons, abilities or whatever) unique such that an army is still only able to represent one.

- Another option would be something akin to Lead Roles for Harlequins in 9th, whereby they can buy a new ability but it replaces their core ability (meaning, again, you can't stack abilities). Thus, a model would have to choose between Leader from Calgar, Knight Champion of Macragge or Lead from the Front (and once again, they could all be 1/army).

- If you prefer the detachment route, you could further lock the above to specific detachments (e.g. if you want Calgar's leadership ability, you need to be playing Ultramarines, which would thus lock you out of the equivalents from Space Wolves, Black Templars et al.).

Part of the reason I use these as examples is that they all of them are from 1 edition ago. So it's not as if this is uncharted territory for GW.

What's more, let's say GW doesn't trust its playerbase to not have fun wrong 'abuse' the system. The easiest way to fix that is by giving those players beta rules to playtest. Use their feedback to see which wargear combinations are problematic and need to be restricted or made mutually-exclusive.

Hell, they could even use similar feedback from prior editions, rather than just throwing all notes in the bin and starting again every time they stick a new number on the game version.

 Daba wrote:
IIRC 'Master Crafted' became a modifier for wargear later, and before you just had 'Master Crafted Bolt Pistol' and their ilk as their own wargear cards with their own unique profiles.

Yes it was two items in 2nd, a bolt pistol and a plasma pistol. Master crafting extended their ranges by 8 and 6 inches respectively and the bolt got a +1 to hit at long range. Otherwise they were identical to the standard version. So mc has been longer range, rerolls to hit and extra damage. No consistency at all despite representing the same thing.

Its why there's no point in arguing over whether a weapon 'must' be distinctive for anything beyond personal preference. Gw certainly doesnt care as is abundantly clear when you just glance at virtually any weapon across editions.

Breton wrote:

 kurhanik wrote:
I'm kind of confused what the disconnect going on in this thread is. I feel people are making the argument that a good strong set of customization options would be a fun way to express characters, and that most (not all but most) named characters could then be specific builds of those options to show what exactly you can do. That way Calgar has ABC, Dante has DEF, Shrike has GHI, and Chapter Master So and So has AH while Such and Such has CDG, etc. People are using Space Marines merely because it is the easiest, but at his core Yarrick is a Commissar with a Power Fist, laser eye, and Bolt Pistol (I think I forget the exact gun he carries) with a rule that makes him a bit harder to kill outright (which could be a generic ability that someone can then pick from). Same can be said for a lot of characters.

Here's hoping the new character customization rules are fun. From the warcom articles it feels kind of simplistic but I've seen things that seem bland but them come out really cool later. But for examples of character customization, I mean just look at older 40k, like the 3.5 dexes are always held on a pedestal for a reason, or for modern stuff look at Old World - big character gets 100 points of magical items to customize, small character gets 50 points, also most characters have a few options they can pick of the non magic variety.

The Disconnect is a combination of the end result goal. Some want to get completely get rid of special characters in and of themselves. Some want to effectively but not outright get rid of special characters. Personally I want to keep the special characters we have (and have GW finish making the ones they should for all of the GW Craftworlds, Chapter+Companies, Septs, Dynasties etc) and have an relatively equal option to make your own for those chapters/companies/septs/craftworlds etc Which means neither "solution" is right the whole time, and we'd have to take some of each.

Wouldn't having a robust character customization system and then keeping bespoke datasheets for the characters who wouldn't neatly fit into that system be an effective way to "take some of each"? If so, then it sounds like the main thing you and I disagree about is whether or not it makes sense to get rid of some existing bespoke datasheets and let them be handled by the generic character customization system.

Breton wrote:I disagree with the premise that named characters are automatically undercosted.

Cool! Do you think that named characters should ever be intentionally undercosted? Personally, I do not. Asking because I'm still trying to figure out if I was understanding the points you were making in previously posts correctly.

* Honor Guard of Macragge: He gets feel no pain wihle he's attached to a squad of honor guard. Other captains could probably have body guards that are especially good at keeping their bosses from getting sniped out.

Yes, I didn't think you meant the entire unit got FNP, I think you were incorrectly describing the ability as requiring the opponent to chew through 30 or more T6ish wounds of Bodyguard to get rid of the FNP.

Nope. Bolded the word in my quote for emphasis. All I was saying was that it's a rule that lets the guy's protectors protect him from sniper attacks more effectively.

I also think you're incorrect for trying to claim this rule was about Calgar. Terminator Calgar does not have this rule. This rule was about the two bodyguards. When they went away because he switched to Terminator Armor, the rule went away.

Sure. In which case, we can throw that rule out. The point I was making was that Calgar doesn't really have any abilities that are especially unique to himself (in terms of lore), so we can toss out that special ability and leave him with even fewer Calgar-specific things that justify him having his own datasheet. That's a point for the argument that Calgar could reasonably be represented with a generic datasheet, yes?

Did you get this so extremely wrong on purpose or in "good faith"?

You're making a lot of personal attacks in this thread, so I thought it might be good to clarify exactly what you're suggesting here. Hypothetically, in this scenario where I'm intentionally going out of my way to get a rule slightly wrong, what's my goal? Are you picturing me crouched over a keyboard plotting out ways to like, ruin your life by suggesting some named character datasheets become generic options instead? Walk me through that scenario, Breton. What kind of villainous antics am I up to?

I asked a question. Like you do when you ask if I'm trolling or in good faith. If you thought it was a personal attack, why did you do it?

Breton wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
If you can reasonably make rules for every single member of a class of unit, I think they’re fine being bespoke.

Primarchs have 16, at most, for 40k. You can make 16 datasheets.
Phoenix Lords have less than a dozen. You can definitely have a datasheet for each one.

There’s around four digits worth of Chapter Masters. You could technically make a sheet for each of them, but that’s wildly impractical.

They definitely shouldn't even try. Those chapters aren't theirs to do it with. I mean sure they put the names and color schemes of what? 50? 60? of them in a Space Marine Codex, but they've put almost no fluff out there for them. Those are the player's chapters. And that's even before the truly DIY chapters. GW should not be making those datasheets. That's what the DIY Character creator should be for. They SHOULD make datasheets for all the chapters (but not necessarily all the characters) they DO "own".

But why?

Genuinely, why? If they can trust the players to make the Chapter Masters and Captains for their own Chapters, why not for the Big Chapters? Why do you need GW to make the ENTIRE Chapter Command for those Chapters? Can't GW just say "hey, Chapter Master Biggus Namius can be represented with X abilities, Captain Lessus Importus can be represented with Y, and Chief Librarian Nerdicus should take Z".

Because GW "owns" those Chapters. Players "own" their own chapters. GW has chosen to control some chapters, and thus they should fully support those Chapters they chose.

They don't own them any more than they "own" any published Chapter. The only Chapters GW doesn't "own" are completely homebrew ones. Anything named by GW is a GW Chapter, no matter if you're the Ultramarines or Omega Marines. So, can players only make custom heroes if they're not using a GW Chapter? What about if I want to represent Chaplain Leandros of the Ultramarines? Or Acheran? Or Chairon? Or Saul Invictus? Or Agemman?

If you're concerned about players only picking the "broken" options, then should we not also be concerned by players picking "broken" named characters (ie, Calgars and Ventrises showing up in every Ultramarines army)? Players will, as I'm sure you're aware of, optimise the fluff out of something if they want to. So why does it matter about if they take the most powerful abilities on their custom characters? They're already doing that, via taking the most effective Epic Heroes in the first place.

I genuinely don't get why you believe that GW *should* do this. Why do they NEED to make all these bespoke characters, especially if you're also going to claim that players should be able to make custom heroes themselves, just not specifically from the Big Chapters? What does that add to the game?

There are 8 more captains beyond the two I said should be made. I get you don't get it, but I don't get why you don't get it. Those are the Chapters GW made. They should be the ones to fully support and flesh out all of those chapters. They should also create a matrix so people can make their own dudes for their chapters. They shouldn't make the Chapter Command of Chapters they opened up to the players by not doing anything but color scheme or that players made entirely themselves. This isn't contradictory.

GW made the Chapter, but it doesn't mean that they need to prescribe everything to do with it. Will they publish a list of what units each company has, and you can only bring those units if you're playing that company? Will there be a list of names for every vehicle, so that every vehicle is correctly named? Why haven't GW gotten rid of the option for Ultramarines to play Vanguard Spearhead or Blood Angels to play Gladius?

Back to characters: GW could very well just say "yes, Marneus Calgar is the Chapter Master of the Ultramarines. You can represent him by using a Captain in Terminator or Gravis Armour, with the following upgrades and wargear:
- Chapter Master
- Two Master Crafted Power Fists (grants Twinlinked)
- Two Master Crafted Storm Bolters (grants Twinlinked)
- Advance, Shoot and Charge Rule
- +1CP Rule
- +1 Toughness"

GW gets to dictate what "Marneus Calgar" is meant to be like, and doesn't need to make a unique datasheet to do it. Then, all they need to do is restrict exactly how many of each ability can show up (if that's what they're concerned about, which I personally don't think they are), and voila.

Breton wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
I thought that’d be pretty obvious. It’s not “Here’s one option to make Calgar,” it’s “Calgar is a Captain, upgraded to Chapter Master. He is armed with twin MC Powerfists, and an MC Storm Bolter. He has the Nimble and Tactical upgrades from the Leadership category.”

One of the problems with that is you just eliminated the Gauntlets of Ultramar.... And all the wargear that is in itself a character in the world.

Already been done in the past, GW's pre-empted you there.

5th edition Space Marines Codex:
Calgar: "Gauntlets of Ultramar: These are a matched pair of power fists. They also contain a pair of integrated bolters that can be fired with the following profile" - the only unique part is the bolter attachment, which has a bespoke profile.
Sicarius: "Talassarian Tempest Blade: This is a power weapon. If Sicarius wishes, he can attempt a single 'coup de grace' attack in lieu of his normal close combat attacks. If the coup de grace hits, it is resolved at a Strength of 6 and causes Instant Death, regardless of the wounded model's Toughness." - a regular power sword with a unique attack mode which it can swap out for. Also carries a regular plasma pistol, not even the new artisan one.
Tigurius: "Rod of Tigurius: The Rod of Tigurius is a master-crafted force weapon." Nothing unique except the name.
Cassius: "Infernus: This is a master-crafted combi-flamer, lovingly crafted and modified by Cassius himself. Note that the boltgun is loaded with hellfire rounds and will therefore wound any model on a 2+." A generic weapon, but has hellfire rounds (which were a generic upgrade that any Captain or Chapter Master could have). Still pretty normal.
Telion: "Stalker Pattern Boltgun: Telion commonly carries a boltgun equipped with a targeter and loaded with silenced shells. It can be fired with the following profile" - the first COMPLETELY unique weapon on this list, and only because he had the very first Stalker Pattern Boltgun with bespoke rules. This is the correct use of a unique profile, because literally nothing like this existed anywhere else in the Codex.
Chronus: nothing unique or named
Pedro Kantor: "Dorn's Arrow: This ancient and venerated storm bolter has the following profile" - unique storm bolter profile, but ONLY refers to the storm bolter! The power fist is just a power fist, and isn't even called Dorn's Arrow.
Darnath Lysander: "The Fist of Dorn: This is a master-crafted thunder hammer. All hits from the Fist of Dorn are resolved at Strength 10 and add +1 to rolls on the vehicle damage table." - generic weapon, with an extra bit of strength and bonus rule. Still easily just reflected as a generic weapon, but I'll grant that this is more unique.
Kayvaan Shrike: "The Raven's Talons: These are a pair of master-crafted lightning claws. They also bestow the Rending special rule on Shrike's close combat attacks." - again, a generic weapon, with a single special rule. Slightly more unique than a normal weapon, but less so than Lysander's.
Vulkan He'stan: Two weapons! "The Gauntlet of the Forge: This armoured gauntlet can be fired as a heavy flamer." and "The Spear of Vulkan: This is a master-crafted relic blade." Literally two generic weapons. The only unique part is the name, and that Vulkan can have a heavy flamer. Still just represented with generic stats.
Kor'sarro Khan: "Moonfang: This is an ancient power sword and a relic of the White Scars Chapter. Any rolls to wound on which Kor'sarro scores a 6 will cause Instant Death, regardless of the target's Toughness." A generic power sword with a unique Devastating Wounds-esque effect. Again, doesn't need a unique profile, and can be represented with a special rule.

So, out of 10 heroes in the 5th edition codex, one has an entirely unique weapon profile (Telion), two have unique ranged weapon profiles but a generic melee (Calgar's Gauntlets of Ultramar, and Pedro Kantor's Dorn's Arrow, which I *could* count seperately because Dorn's Arrow only refers to the storm bolter, and not the power fist in the 5th ed book), two have a generic weapon normally unavailable to them (Cassius and Vulkan), four have a generic weapon, with a single added special feature (Sicarius, Lysander, Shrike and Khan), and two have has completely generic weapons (Tigurius and Chronus).

Given that the majority of these characters only have generic weapon profiles (with a single added rule on them), this could easily be represented in the same way Enhancements are in current 10th ed (this model's X has +1 Y) or so on. All GW has to do is have a little page on each Chapter, and on it, it lists all these special characters, and then gives the list of what options to take in order to represent them. On the fluff pages for those characters, it can then say about how Sicarius' sword is actually the Talassarian Tempest Blade and his pistol is called Luxos, and so on.

And this isn't even getting into how most special rules in 10th are just drawn from a list of generic ones, and renamed before distribution.