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Don't get me wrong. I love my Sisters of Battle. They were my first army, and they will always be a warm spot in my heart for them, but I am very disappointed in what GW has done with their new Codex. I understand what they did, but it still hurts my insides.

For those who dont know much about the Sisters, I'll explain:
There are(were) more or less 2 factions of the Sister's military might. They are the military force of the Ecclesiarchy (the Church of the Emperium), and assisting the Inquisitors of the Ordo Hereticus in their duties to purge and cleanse the universe from witches, traitors, and heretics. Cool right? I thought so. In the "Witch Hunters" Codex, you had the choice of Going the Ecclesiarchy route (strictly SoB), or the Inquisition route. With the Inquisitor, you could also aquire the help of Imperial Guard or even Space Marines, and use the Adeptus Arbites (Inquisitorial Storm Troopers). It had SO much potential for and outstanding army combining the best parts of the race of Man into One army.... but NOOOOOO!!!!

They took out the Inquisition from the Sisters of Battle.... and gave EVERYTHING to the Grey Knights.... I have grown a small hatred for them to be honest.... I'll explain why:
The Grey Knights used to be basically the same as the Sisters. "Daemon Hunters" "Witch Hunters" ect. Then the GKs had their own Codex, complete with new models, new rules, and complete Inquisitorial reign. Then the rumors of the Sisters, seemed promising. I expected the same treatment for my girls, and you know what they got?? Less than 30 pages of a so called "codex" inside two issues of White Dwarf. They SPIT on them. They weren't even on the Cover! With about three pages of fluff (none of it really new), and only two "new" characters.

Two people doesn't make up for the fact that the army lost the ONLY psyker it had. And taking out 90% of the wargear.

Although I'm upset, I will still play them. They didn't screw up EVERYthing.

Good things:
Saint Celestine is Stronger and costs alot less
The Preists are stronger and their battle conclave is Close Quarters masters
The Penitent Engine has a possible 14 attacks a turn (S-10... NBD)

BUUUUT still. I'm upset I lost my Inq to the Grey Knights... (Bastards...)

Comment if you want....

Hey, at least be happy the Sisters of Battle are getting an update at all, and not being discontinued like the you-know-what. Hopefully with a new codex, new models will come forward, and Sisters will be less expensive money wise. The Gothic feel to them always captured my interest, and with luck I can get started on them for real.

Right now GW gave the Grey knights everthing is because they are changing the 40k story around. They what the Iquisition and the Ecclesiarchy to be separate from one another. That means they will be able to make new models for the Sisters next codex which will bring people to purchase more from their stores. However right not you can still use Flagellants, Deathcult Assassins, and Crusaders for you battle Conclaves.

In fairness, Sisters of Battle were in fact on the cover of both WDs... in the form of a single line of text at the top that basically said, "Sisters of Battle Codex inside!"

I too was disappointed by the brevity of the Sisters Codex, but I suppose it's to be expected, as if they had both a full 100+pages of stuff ready, accompanied by a large slew of miniatures, they'd've released a proper Codex rather than a simple WD dex.

Personally, I try really hard to not read much into the Sisters dex being so short, or being at the very back of the content section of both WDs, or the brief and detail-less Sisters vs. Nids battle report in the same WD as the much more robust Ogres battle report. Sometimes it can be hard not to read any malice or neglect into it.

Realistically, though, they probably weren't just ready to release a proper book and models. If they were, they'd've started reaping the profits as soon as possible, and I can't see them printing a WD dex a short time before a proper book comes out. It'd be a waste of their time and resources, because that's space that could be better used advertising the minis that were released this and last month. I'll admit there are possible holes in that theory, but I choose to think that GW doesn't treat Sisters of Battle with malice.

I was looking at the GK's Codex but didn't have time to do some real reading. I saw that it had Inqs fro all three Ordos. Can THEY combine with Space Marines/IG ect? If not, how are the Inqs from the Ordos supposed to do their job? Story speaking. I get that the Hereticus can just use the Arbites (Storm Troopers) but what is the Ordo Xenos without the Death Watch?

Yeah, I wish they'd ruin my Tau codex in a WD, that would just be awful. /sarcasm.

agnosto wrote:Yeah, I wish they'd ruin my Tau codex in a WD, that would just be awful. /sarcasm.

Don't get me wrong, I'm glad for the attention. ^_^

Just wanted to point out, you keep saying Adeptus Arbites(Storm Troopers). You know that they are two very different things right?

lledwey wrote:Just wanted to point out, you keep saying Adeptus Arbites(Storm Troopers). You know that they are two very different things right?

I seem to remember a codex(Witch Hunters I think) saying that you could represent the Arbites by having all of the Hellguns on Storm Troopers replaced with shotguns.

Right, I'm talking about the fluff, which is what I thought the OP was implying. Might have misunderstood though.

Inquisitor Cyotle wrote:I was looking at the GK's Codex but didn't have time to do some real reading. I saw that it had Inqs fro all three Ordos. Can THEY combine with Space Marines/IG ect?

Nope. The only time you can take units from multiple Codices is in an Apocalypse battle. In a straightforward 40K game, the Inquisition are as oddly segregated from the diverse Imperial forces they can requisition without question as the World Eaters are from Juggernauts and Flesh Hounds.

Looking at how 8ed Warhammer has BRB rules for alliances, I wouldn't be massively surprised if a similar arrangement were to emerge in 6ed 40K.

The Sisters of Battle have ALWAYS been the militant arm of the Ecclesiarchy, NOT the chamber militant of the Ordo Hereticus.

But, as an Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor, what troops are going to be the easiest to motivate with less chance of corruption? The Adepta Sororitas.

I agree, the Inquisitors in the Grey Knight codex are a missed opportunity. Inquisitors should be a HQ choice in each Imperial codex IMO, and each one should unlock certain troops from other codexes. So taking an Ordo Malleus Inquisitor in your Imperial Guard army could give you access to some Grey Knights units, or taking an Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor in your Space Marines army could give you access to certain units from the Sisters of Battle army list.

But personally, I'm glad the SoB have returned to their roots as an independant force, fighting for the church and not for the inquisition.

Kaldor wrote:The Sisters of Battle have ALWAYS been the militant arm of the Ecclesiarchy, NOT the chamber militant of the Ordo Hereticus.quote]

My comment about the "is/was" was about the SoB GW army, not the actual history of them.

But the SoB GW army was originally just SoB and didn't include inquisitors. The Witch Hunters codex is the odd one out in this case.

If GW really wanted to get thier gak together They'd have made the GK book more overtly just the =][= book and made the SoB book a straight ecclesiarchy book. Which more or less it seems like they are doing. QQ all you want, Inquisitorial warbands make more sense than combining vanilla IG and SM under one banner. I do agree that they should be able to ally with any Imperial army, it's fluffy it makes sense. Too much sense, like supplemental codex. The truth is the Inquisition should remain periferial in a game that centers on war, militant politicos and secret police don't DRIVE a war effort they support and possibly influence it.

Screw that AustonT, I want an Administratum army now. Power armoured pocket protectors, plasma pens, rocket desks. It would be amazing.

lledwey wrote:Screw that AustonT, I want an Administratum army now. Power armoured pocket protectors, plasma pens, rocket desks. It would be amazing.

Hm... They could even have special characters with names reminiscent of famous accountants, lawyers, and bureaucrats...

Edit: And fluff. Names and fluff.

I find it weird that Melissia hasn't weighed in. Oh well.

Also, the Penitent Engine has a possible 14 attacks? IMO that makes up for the lack of an Inquisitor. For my Space Marines I would have to give a Devastator Squad four Heavy Bolters and give the sergeant a bolter to get that! And that would probably cost more than a Penitent Engine (I don't know that for sure, I don't play Sisters of Battle )

Isn't the IG an administratum army? Departmento Munitorium is in the administratum.

I have heard a lot of both good and bad comments, I think though, that this is just a patch until they finish everything. Remember they need to redo the entire line, not just a few models, so making everything look right and fit into the nice boxes plus working on fantasy and other 40k projects makes me think that the SOB may end up one of our first 6th ed codex.

Screw the fluff, I'm more concerned that they basically wrote a gimped GEQ Blood Angels book.

doubled wrote:I have heard a lot of both good and bad comments, I think though, that this is just a patch until they finish everything. Remember they need to redo the entire line, not just a few models, so making everything look right and fit into the nice boxes plus working on fantasy and other 40k projects makes me think that the SOB may end up one of our first 6th ed codex.

I believe you would be mistaken about SoB being one of the first 6ed. Granted time will tell and GW sometimes does crazy gak. Virtually guaranteed for the beginning of 6ed are Space Marines and probably Chaos. Tau, Eldar, and Crons have to come up sometime soon. With the SoB WD you can assume at least a year, probably more before a real Sisters codex. My conservative estimate is mid 6, because older MEQ dexes will receive updates to boost sales.

Well supposedly Crons are next, and murmours about Tau are ciricleing. Just starting to hear about a chaos dex, and they have been discussing sisters for a while. Eldar suprisingly has had no real rumours or tidbits about being in the works. This shocks me because in my area at least, eldar are a popular army.

Really? From what I've thought, the sisters look to be a late 5th, probably the last army to get a codex for this edition.

I think it's fairly reasonable to assume that every other dex will be space marines. So if crons come next then after that will probably come dark angels or black Templar. I virtually guarantee the next Space Marines will be released in conjunction with 6th.


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FourCartridge wrote:Really? From what I've thought, the sisters look to be a late 5th, probably the last army to get a codex for this edition.

With this WD release you can forget a true codex in 5th.

Well, we have Necrons next almost for sure. Tau still need an update, as do BT and DA. Chaos is pretty old too. A lot of what's going around is saying that 6th might be next summer. Between now and then, theres almost no chance of them doing a full SoB book. This was intended to get people by, especially since WH wasn't horrible competetively (although it was pretty limited in choice of build.) They will definitely do Necrons, Tau, and at least one of the above Marine books before 6th. If it is next summer and the new Chaos book is around then as well, it could be quite a while before we see SoB in a real codex. This is all conjecture of course, but they are definitely going to hold off on SoB for a whlie now that they got this 'update'.

It took 4 years from WD to Codex for BA and their player base is much larger.

Exactly. This is what I think SoB players should be most upset about. If anything, this WD update pushed their real codex back at least a couple years.

I agree with lledwey. It just bothers me the the GKs got so much attention and love and effort put into their army, and the SoB got this B-S WD crap. :(

I wouldn't be suprised to see Dark Angels just get wrapped up into the vinilla marine codex, honestly they are not very different from normal space marines and include the ravenwing and deathwing characters and there you have it. I pray they don't for the most part, but it would make one less codex to upgrade.