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So yea I have always wondered if anyone (besides me) forgoes the use of special characters.

I do it because I just feel that my army looses its flavor if I had calgar or shrike leading it and besides theres no hero who has a Honor Blade and Storm Shield.

I think there are plenty of people that do. We run Dual Lash lists, no room for crappy overpriced characters.

I prefer lots more troops than spending a quarter of my points on a character and a command squad for him.

they're great for APOC matches though!

Using the counts as rule you can use a character in rules only. It even says this in the SM book. So now shrike can be called Captain Eros, heroic commander of the 7th Assault Company of [insert chapter name here]. Then that doesnt interfere with your fluff.

I personally try to stay away from them myself - just really enjoy making my own HQ's. However I might be dumping that concept soon as i get time to expand my armies.

Tau - dont use them, they dont fit my design

DA - currently dont, I want to try DW/RW army at somepoint ergo I am forced to take Bael at the least, However I due use Ezekial as a librarian on occasion, and have Azeral bc I like the modle

Orks - probably going to eventually wind up getting Gaz and Stinkrot - my brother has Yarrik for his Guard and I like the fluff of the two titans clashing again.


Sry if its off topic a bit, was not sure if your only talking about vanilla SM or armies in general.

In my experience, there isn't too much of an over reliance on Special Characters. I use them in my Blood Angels only because it keeps my list unique enough from other SM armies.

I have seen Mech Eldar lists without any special characters, I have seen IG without characters, I have seen Tau.

Of course any Ork or Space Marine list I have seen so far has at least one.

It depends on the list and what the player is trying to get out of it.

I have 4000 points of marines and no special characters at all. Only special character i have is yarrick for my guard (mainly because the model is cool)

I play Tyranids, so no SC's!

...if its friendly battle eldrad stays home ... otherwise he's just so much better then taking 2 normal farseers, and i like to win...

I think the problem with special characters, is they have no down side ... ok they cost alot, but they worth it ... but if you took X and couldn't take Y & Z people might think twice about them

Vulkan has a strength 6 weapon and a 3+ invul. It's not an honor blade and storm shield, but it's effectively the same.

I dont like using special characters but with the latest round of codexii, some are just too damn good not to pass up.

My Nids have none

My Eldar cant use any of the Special Characters since I run a Sam Hain list

My Tau have no room for Special Characters

My Guard need the points else where and those special characters dont have much utility in 5th.

It comes basically down to Marines and Orks as my marines require the buffs some of those characters give and with orks its the same thing.

The current design philosophy for 40k aims towards special characters that can buff the army or parts of it usually making them far superior to their normal counterparts.

I never use 'em, I just like making my own HQ's because I feel they add to my armies flavor.
even though I own both the Ghazzie & Typhus models neither have ever seen any action on the table.

There aren't very many Special Characters left in the game. The new codeci have HQ (and other) choices which are named, unique Independent Characters. But Special Characters - like characters requiring an army of a specific size - are going the way of the dodo.

My battle wagon list simply doesn't have enough room for a special character;

besides, a KFF mek is far more important then what the special characters give me.

thehod wrote:The current design philosophy for 40k aims towards special characters that can buff the army or parts of it usually making them far superior to their normal counterparts.

hits the nail on the head. the older special characters were generally pretty powerful uber-units, but the latest crop seems to be more along the lines of army-customization choices. They replaced chapter traits with a character that gives an army special ability. You pay a little more than a chump commander with similar gear, and you get an ability across your whole army. I fully believe that the new generation of special characters will fall into this category, and we will start to see this with the next few codexes.

I used to avoid using special characters completely. Khan is the first I have used with regularity, and the only way for me to play "White scars" as opposed to "chumps on bikes." His army special ability is useful, but I do not believe it is game breaking. His close combat ability is decent, but not really much above that of any other commander or substantially lower, as I would otherwise give my capt. a relic blade.

I don't ever use them, I prefer to use the extra points elsewhere and go with tooled up standard HQ choices.

Wakinglimb wrote:I prefer to use the extra points elsewhere and go with tooled up standard HQ choices.

In all fairness, special characters tend to deliver more than their point value would suggest. If you kit out a normal HQ and try to duplicate wargear and approximate value of special abilities, he's probably going to cost more and do less than the "special character". Prime examples: Kairos, Vulkan, Grotsnik, etc.

back when I was a n00b I had the inevitable love affair with special characters, but for a long time now Ive considered their use as something that detracts from a well fluffed out army.

why use someone else's vision of awesome when you can create your own?

somecallmeJack wrote:back when I was a n00b I had the inevitable love affair with special characters, but for a long time now Ive considered their use as something that detracts from a well fluffed out army.

why use someone else's vision of awesome when you can create your own?

Because of the way that "named" characters offer things that can't otherwise be gotten, or because of the way that they change the flavor of your army to more accurately reflect the vision of what you want to play.

I did use Kharn the betrayer in my world eaters list for a while, then I moved to polytheism and lash was so much better than any chaos SC in the 1.5 to 2K games area.

For my daemons, I've flirted with Skulltaker (fun but not really usefull) and also the Masque (jury's out on how usefull she is) And I'll be honest I do have a LOC I'll be converting into fateweaver, as he's just too good!

Centurian99 wrote:

somecallmeJack wrote:back when I was a n00b I had the inevitable love affair with special characters, but for a long time now Ive considered their use as something that detracts from a well fluffed out army.

why use someone else's vision of awesome when you can create your own?

Because of the way that "named" characters offer things that can't otherwise be gotten, or because of the way that they change the flavor of your army to more accurately reflect the vision of what you want to play.

hmm, youre right, I s'pose. I still haven't had chance to get a game in in 5th. I still think in terms of 3rd. tis a learning curve

sourclams wrote:

Wakinglimb wrote:I prefer to use the extra points elsewhere and go with tooled up standard HQ choices.

In all fairness, special characters tend to deliver more than their point value would suggest. If you kit out a normal HQ and try to duplicate wargear and approximate value of special abilities, he's probably going to cost more and do less than the "special character". Prime examples: Kairos, Vulkan, Grotsnik, etc.

You're always paying something for a special rule (apart from maybe with cassius). I just find that the rule is never really worth it unless you theme your whole army around it.

I use Kor'Sarro Khan with a command squad on bikes quite a bit because they are loads of fun to play.

I have all of the special characters for my armies. they are beautiful models. But, I very rarely if ever play them. The only one that I might use in the near future is Farsight and thats just to get acces to his army.

On the flip side I have a converted model I use for Captain Tycho in my BA army. You can definitely build a generic captain that is better BUT seeing that Tycho was originally a generic captain that somehow became a special character I can't help but love him. Obviously in a big tournament I will field Dante or Mephiston but some people besides myself also appreciate Captain Tycho as well.

G

I've never been tempted to use special characters,I've always
thought they'd only be of use in big points games or even
apocalypse.Most players have only got time for on average,
1500-2000pt games.Why invest so much in a character who will
become target number one,and when he's obliterated that
will be a huge chunk of your force gone.Marine forces are
specialised and when one part is destroyed you are in
trouble!Double that if you spend a lot of points on a
character.

lifeafter wrote:Vulkan has a strength 6 weapon and a 3+ invul. It's not an honor blade and storm shield, but it's effectively the same.

I'm making count's as models for every SC (yes... i'm an addict) and my plan for vulkan is a storm shield and a BIG ing sword

And mr. OP, you can convert the SC's to fit your fluff better, so the ultramarines kantor model that I made for my friend is proudly standing on top of a carnifex head, with ultramarines stuff all over him.

Slipstream wrote:I've never been tempted to use special characters,I've always
thought they'd only be of use in big points games or even
apocalypse.Most players have only got time for on average,
1500-2000pt games.Why invest so much in a character who will
become target number one,and when he's obliterated that
will be a huge chunk of your force gone.Marine forces are
specialised and when one part is destroyed you are in
trouble!Double that if you spend a lot of points on a
character.

Ok... lets use the SM's as examples ok?

1) Cassius, if you erally need a chaplain on a bike, or flying through the sky you've been left high and dry my friend, as the 25 points you pay for:

FNP
Shooting wounds on a 2+
toughness 6
combi-flamer
re-rolling shooting attacks... is a bargain.

Up until the latest Marine codex, I have only used Specials in "fun" games. However with the removal of chapter traits and making them part of characters I have with marines.

1. DA I don't.
2. Eldar I have played around with them but other than fluffy phoenix lords never used them.
3. Tyranids... never
4. BA never
5. CSM ... never

They are invariably a 20 to 100% cost over a generic and especially at the lower point totals, a big drain on the composition of the army... 100 pts on a character can almost be a 3rd vindicator or extra dreadnought.

I only use special characters if in that game they are just that: special. My vampire counts army could represent mannfred von carsteins army (being a von carstein army after all) so I would use him from time to time.

My Eldar army is somewhat reaper orientated and therefore I sometimes use Maugan Ra with additional Reapers. But it's more of a fun army I play form time to time.

I would never use Eldrad for example because he doesn't fit in my theme at all...

Greets
Schepp himself