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hey guys, just curious.

I'm assumeing no, but in large tournaments [adepticon comes to mind] are fandexes accepted?

as in, non-GW release codexes, if you need it clarified.

no, they are not widely accepted. I personally wouldn't play with them, because even when I play casually, i'm generally preparing for an upcoming tournament, and as such would only want to play against other legal lists.

Apocalypse games, however, are where i'd say go for it, as long as your opponent can see it and say OK.

Considering what happened when Codex Pan-Fo was reviled... not only are they not widely accepted... they are often the target of ridicule.

No, people generally prefer to play by GW's rules.

Certainly not in tournaments. GW's rules reign supreme there, and rightfully so. There's no GW standard for fandexes.

In friendly games, though, I'd say go for it, as long as your opponent approves.

I don't play fandexes ever as they are prone to " what I think they deserve" whish is usually not what makes them balanced.

Having faced 'custom characters' before, I'm certainly not going to play a home made codex without getting a chance to read it first, and it's certainly never going to be allowed at a tournament.

Captain Solon wrote:hey guys, just curious.

I'm assumeing no, but in large tournaments [adepticon comes to mind] are fandexes accepted?

as in, non-GW release codexes, if you need it clarified.

Would it have been possible for you to have asked a sillier question?
I mean seriously. "Hey guys, in big tournaments specifically for GW games, can I use rules that have nothing at all to do with GW?"

No.

You can use any GW model to represent any unit in any codex with a little converting to satisfy WYSIWYG and proper bases so i don't know why you would use a fan-dex when you can make any imaginary army you want and represent them with rules from any codex. Why go through the trouble of play testing new rules when you can use the ones your given.

Maybe because, say, instead of playing "Sisters as Space Wolves", we want to play actual "Sisters of Battle" as Space Wolves are T4/S4 base and therefor not human (S3(4) would be fine as Sisters are in power armor, but T3 is human toughness...)?

At least that's the purpose behind my fandex, although I really have no intent on actually using it (conversions are a pain on one-pose metal models).

Maybe it is because of my BFG background, where if it weren't for fan support there'd be no support at all, but I would be willing to play a "fan-dex" in a friendly game, no problem.

However, tournaments are out just because they are supposed to be competitive, sanctioned events and there is no way all of the sets of fan rules could be properly vetted for such an event IMO.

well, for the most part, nothing changes. It's mostly special characters, the troops are cohesive with SM Vanilly, with different names.

it's not a case of 'I think that all my SM should get power swords as base for free.'

it's more giving the SM codex a more -me- feel. I've changed the name of Tac marine to Offspring, and sergeants are parents. [goes with 'sons of the father emperor']

Well, if you are just using the basic SM rules with different names, there would be no problem with using them in a tournament I would think. Not having been in any tournaments (yet!), I can't say for sure.

Don't make trouble for yourself. Write up your SM list, give it to the TO, and then call them what they are on the table. All you're going to do with a fandex (even one that just renames everything) is unfairly confuse your opponents, and that's not good sportsmanship.

erwos wrote:Don't make trouble for yourself. Write up your SM list, give it to the TO, and then call them what they are on the table. All you're going to do with a fandex (even one that just renames everything) is unfairly confuse your opponents, and that's not good sportsmanship.

Personally, this is what I do.

I'd rather not confuse my opponents by saying things like, "my Holy Martyrs and Saint fire at your Boyz Mob," and hope he remembers which of my units are Holy Martyrs, and which one is the Saint. Much easier to call them that outside of combat, and on the table just say, "My assault squad and Chaplain fire at your Boyz Mob."

thats bad. you should be pointing to the unit anyway.

Certainly not in any tournaments, and they usually aren't welcome in casual games at our FLGS either. You'll possibly get a friend willing to playtest one of your fandexes, such as the time I had a match against against a proxy-Custode army.

I have nothing against the guy, but his rules were poor. Very much so. He was looking for an army not only more elite than GK, but one that made GK termies look like Gretchin in comparison. In 1500 points you could max out about 15 models. No vehichles whatsoever, but a ridiculour amount of special rules that made the Custodes all but indestructable. Even then I wouldn't really have minded, but he didn't even bother to put any Custode models together, and just used 'counts as' CSM.

Emp, I find that insulting.

I barely go for more then 3 or four special rules, and thats even including ATSKNF.

the problem will always be that unless you do something with a whole gaming group, where special rules get tested and tried and altered depending on feedback against a wide variety of different armies and different people running them you'll get something unbalanced.

Captain Solon wrote:Emp, I find that insulting.

I barely go for more then 3 or four special rules, and thats even including ATSKNF.

What are you talking about? This was a single experience with a friend that had written his own (Over the top) fandex...poorly. I wasn't judging your work, just saying that fandexes aren't extremely popular here and they definitely wouldn't be used in tournies. In answer to the OP; No. Not here anyways.

Well, GW doesn't support those codices.

Here is a CLASH OF THE 40K ONLINE FANDEXES: EO HARLEQUINS VS KHODEXUS DARK ELDAR 2K (battle report)

http://www.40konline.com/community/index.php?topic=201718.0

Captain Solon wrote:well, for the most part, nothing changes. It's mostly special characters, the troops are cohesive with SM Vanilly, with different names.

it's not a case of 'I think that all my SM should get power swords as base for free.'

it's more giving the SM codex a more -me- feel. I've changed the name of Tac marine to Offspring, and sergeants are parents. [goes with 'sons of the father emperor']

It comes down to this:
If your rules are so slight, like renaming units, just go with the base codex. No need to confuse your opponent for something as trivial as what you want to call your units.
If your rules are very different, then you should definitely not be trying to play them in any sort of serious game.

There's the two solutions for you, and neither of them are "play your fan-dex in a tournament".

Fair enough.

Captain Solon wrote:thats bad. you should be pointing to the unit anyway.

Yes, but if they're halfway across the table, without leaning over your carefully placed minis and risking disrupting the whole battlefield, you can't always be entirely clear which unit you're pointing at. Which is why you say the name of the unit at the same time.

Well, you move until you can reach it.

Captain Solon wrote:Well, you move until you can reach it.

Just for shooting? Not moving or assaulting? Nah.

Don't wanna leave my seat, walk around the table, just to point.

I'll just point from afar and say the name of the unit. I might add something like "the tactical squad that's currently in cover" or "to your left of that predator" to clarify.

What about:

Codex: USMC/SPARTAN

and

Codex: Covenent


Fandexes based on Halo Universe

or

Codex: Locust

and

Codex: CoG

Fandexes based on Gears of War Universe

Remember, the chaos gods can twist realities, and the Tyrandis themselves are known to come from another galaxy (The Galaxy of BlizzardentertainmentIPia aka Starcraftia)

I'm with SH sometimes its just not practical to get closer either, my flgs has 12 boards side by side and not a lot of room either side, so if I'm on one of the middle tables should I disrupt everyone's game just to point at which of my renamed vanilla units I'm talking about?

If you're not changing it significanly why bother with a fandex? How about a personalised unit instead if you have to have something unique?

I always thought that Tyranids were inspired mostly by the Alien movies, with a dash of Starship Troopers (the book) for flavor. Hard to see how Blizzard could be the source, since the 'Nids date all the way back to the 1980s...

Why do you need fandexes for that? Starcraft is entirely based on 40k, and most modern gritty sci-fi IPs are heavily influenced by Aliens and 40k (the cleaner ones being based largely on Star Trek and Star Wars), both of which are based on Starship Troopers, who pioneered the Space Marine archetype about eighty years ago IIRC...

So, just use Codex: IG and Codex: Tyranids for Starcraft, same codexes for Starship Troopers, and Aliens... and call your units whatever you want them to represent.

As for Halo and Gears, proxy some Space Marines as Spartans or CoG soldiers. You could use Codex: WH for the Covenant with alien models, and Codex: Tyranids with humanoid models for Locusts.