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Sarouan wrote:
You're trying to say that using a halberd and shield as fighting style is a suspension of disbelief in 40k.

No.

My point, which I thought was perfectly clear, was that the more fantastical the universe, the more the simple things stick out when they're not right. In a world with space-ships and daemons from another dimension, it's going to be things like "one-handed halberds" that stand out as weird.

And I see we've just skipped past the Inquisitorial Acolyte stuff now that you've been shown to have no idea what the rest of us were talking about.

A.T. wrote:
What design constraint?

Well, there's a finite amount of unit entries a book can hold. I'm not even talking about internal balancing, there's only so many pages to go around.

While I'll always have a soft spot for crusade style SoB, where the Sisters were an actual elite component of the force, I get why GW wants the current iteration to be more focused. People just don't appreciate screaming hordes of self mutilated fanatics they way they used to back in the day...

 His Master's Voice wrote:
Well, there's a finite amount of unit entries a book can hold. I'm not even talking about internal balancing, there's only so many pages to go around.

What are the marines up to these days, 120 units?
Sisters are ~25 units IIRC, including the new ones. So i'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest half a dozen ecclesiarchal units isn't going to break the back of the faction any time soon.

 His Master's Voice wrote:
I get why GW wants the current iteration to be more focused. People just don't appreciate screaming hordes of self mutilated fanatics they way they used to back in the day...

Well they did just release new plastic repentia, arco-flagellants, and penitent engines so that probably isn't the case. And then there are the all new hedonites...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Sarouan wrote:
You're trying to say that using a halberd and shield as fighting style is a suspension of disbelief in 40k.

No.

My point, which I thought was perfectly clear, was that the more fantastical the universe, the more the simple things stick out when they're not right. In a world with space-ships and daemons from another dimension, it's going to be things like "one-handed halberds" that stand out as weird.

And I see we've just skipped past the Inquisitorial Acolyte stuff now that you've been shown to have no idea what the rest of us were talking about.

Not at all, my point about Acolytes still stand even if we don't take into account the servo-skulls. It's just pointless to talk about it anymore, since you don't want to aknowledge the fact that older versions weren't giving you the possibility to take different detachments from multiple codexes like in V8, and thus the "freedom" isn't just limited to one Inquisitorial list like before. So the possibilities aren't the same as well and the fact there are less options in the inquisitorial retinue don't matter as much like before.


And about your point, it's exactly the same answer : if using a halberd one handed is making it stand out as weird for you, then you should have already ticked about the rest before it. 40k was always that way. Saying it stand out weird now is the weird thing. That you didn't answer that is not surprising : you don't want to, because it would go against your own argument.

What I mean if it wasn't the halberd, it would be another thing someone doesn't agree with. When the Parangon battlesuits were revealed, it was because the sisters look non-sensical or whatever because their arms were put in the battlesuits arms while the legs are. Or that the proportions weren't correct given the battlesuit's leg position. Or whatever else. Every 40k release has something weird and unrealistic to someone. Even when they're not realist on purpose.

Sarouan wrote:
It's just pointless to talk about it anymore, since you don't want to aknowledge the fact that older versions weren't giving you the possibility to take different detachments from multiple codexes like in V8, and thus the "freedom" isn't just limited to one Inquisitorial list like before

Off topic, but the old WH/DH books could draw units from guard and marines (and the other inquisition books). Without all of the penalties and limitations you suffer in 9th for doing so.

9th edition in general is not particularly friendly to armies who are looking to mix and match (though it doesn't outright prevent it either).

A.T. wrote:

 jake wrote:
I'm suggesting that they should be expanded into their own line that can be used along side Sisters by people who want to do that. This would allow Sisters to grow as its own army without the design constraint of extraneous non-Sisters units, and potentially allow the Ministorium units to grow as an allied force for Sisters, INQ and Guard. Nothing is lost, but new possibilities are gained.

What design constraint?

Well, as many people have pointed out, Sisters already has LOTS of melee units. The new Ceslestians may or may not fill a niche, but there would be a LOT more room for a new melee unit without Arcos, Crusaders, Death Cult assassins and Penitent Engines. Those non-Sisters units fill a lot of design space in the army. Removing them, removing that design constraint, makes room new Sisters units that can fill those spaces.

It works the other way too. without sisters to fill the space of Line Infantry, Veterans, Heavy Weapons, Leaders and fast attackers the Ministorium units could be expanded. a lot of people seem to really want Frateris Militia return. Thats currently a niche filled by Battle Sister Squads. But if Sisters and Ministorium were separate forces that wouldn't be a problem.

 jake wrote:
Those non-Sisters units fill a lot of design space in the army. Removing them, removing that design constraint, makes room new Sisters units that can fill those spaces.

That statement cannot be supported by the ongoing actions of GW.

Games Workshop has not demonstrated any kind of balanced codex structure concerns when adding units - if the ecclesiarchy was split off it'd still be even odds for their next three units to be glass cannon melee units and the next three sisters units to be power armoured infantry carrying bolters, flamers, and meltaguns... or a vindicator, techpriest, and stormraven.

Sarouan wrote:
Not at all, my point about Acolytes still stand...

Except it doesn't, because your point is contradicted by the facts of the rules in question. You didn't seem to realise what Acolyte rules we were talking about. Someone even had to post a link to the old rules.

Sarouan wrote:
... since you don't want to aknowledge the fact that older versions weren't giving you the possibility to take different detachments from multiple codexes like in V8, and thus the "freedom" isn't just limited to one Inquisitorial list like before. So the possibilities aren't the same as well and the fact there are less options in the inquisitorial retinue don't matter as much like before.

Were we even talking about that? Why would I (or anyone) acknowledge a point that is irrelevant to the discussion at hand?

Your initial argument was that the "[a]colyte rules were never as complete as [we] would like to cover all the possibilities like in the RPG Dark Heresy..." which, as shown time and time again, simply isn't true. The Dark Heresy Acolytes are essentially more fleshed out extensions of the Daemon/Witch Hunter Henchmen retinues (makes sense, it's an RPG, allowing for greater granularity than a D6 based wargame).

You then followed up with the notion that the Inquisitorial retinues "weren't unique or anything you couldn't make from the former codexes, actually. They were litterally imperial guards / storm troopers...", which, again, is false. Demonstrably false. Categorically false.

Now you're talking about multiple detachments and other stuff that never entered into the original argument. Before that you brought up Daemonhosts, which weren't even part of Inquisitorial retinues. So, again, it seems like you don't really know what we're arguing about because you keep talking about things that are either unrelated or flat out wrong.

I don't know how to proceed when a conversation about apples starts and one person won't stop talking about oranges.

Sarouan wrote:
... then you should have already ticked about the rest before it.

Then I have no recourse but to surmise that you simply don't understand what we're talking about. I see no other possibility here. Sorry you don't get it. *shrugs*

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i look at older models and wonder how GW ever got big as a company if they made things that looked like that.

That’s because, at the time, most of the competition looked even worse.

 jake wrote:

 MonkeyBallistic wrote:
But here’s the issue I have and the reason I’m upset (that’s too strong a word, it’s just toy soldiers after all), the army used to be called Witch Hunters. They renamed the army to the name of just one part of the army, then we have people saying that all those other units really have no place being in the army that they used to be a part of. Talk about moving the goal posts. It’s like if they’d renamed Craftworld Eldar, Aspect Warriors and people were now claiming that all those other units were just there to make up the numbers and really have no part in the future of the Aspect Warriors army.

Or to put it another way, you used to be able to legitimately play both Witch Hunters and Grey Knights as an Inquisition army with support from either Grey Knights or Sisters. That’s basically gone. That makes me sad to the point that I don’t want to have anything to do with 40K these days other than reading the fiction (about Inquisitors mostly).

BEFORE the army was Witch Hunters it was Sisters of Battle. And then instead of giving us the same updates and plastic releases that most other 3rd edition armies got they changed us to an Inquisition force, stuck in a bunch of random non-sisters stuff and Sisters became guest stars in what used to be their own army.

I'm sorry you've lost out on an army you enjoyed. That sucks. But I'm not sorry that Sisters actually finally got to be Sisters again after a lifetime of waiting.

Maybe you should campaign for an actual INQ force that doesn't co-opt someone elses army and release schedule?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sunny Side Up wrote:

 jake wrote:
They only showed up in the Witch Hunters codex along with the INQ elements.

I disagree that cutting the non-Sisters elements of the army removes character. Instead, it finally returns the army's original character. I remember when Witch Hunters was first released and so many of us were so disappointed to find that Sisters had become supporting characters in their own army for a circus of Inquisitors and freakshow randos. There were a LOT of very unhappy Sisters players.

So you may wish the army was more Witch Hunter flavored. Fine. I wish all that stuff could be stripped from the army. But I think a good compromise would be to put Priests, Missionaries, Arcos, Crusdaers, Penitent Engines, Deathcult Assassins and any other random Ministorium stuff in its own supplement that can be take along side Sisters (Or Guard, or INQ). That was Sisters can expand and be about actual Sisters, but people who like Witch Hunters or just Ministorium stuff can use as much of that as they like.

That doesn't make sense.

If you don't like some of the options in the army, don't use them.

Denying other people who enjoy those options the opportunity to take them would have zero impact on your army.

I'm not advocating denying anyone the use of those models. I'm suggesting that they should be expanded into their own line that can be used along side Sisters by people who want to do that. This would allow Sisters to grow as its own army without the design constraint of extraneous non-Sisters units, and potentially allow the Ministorium units to grow as an allied force for Sisters, INQ and Guard. Nothing is lost, but new possibilities are gained.

Here is the thing though, we've already seen where this goes with how horribly Daemonhunters was butchered up. Before, they were: Inquisition, Imperial Guard Stormtroopers, Grey Knights, and could take a small force of either Imperial Guard or Space Marines without penalty. Now? Unless you want a single Inquisitor and none of their other units, you need an Inquisitor Detachment, a Guard (specifically Scions if you want the 4+ armor hellgun guys, though they aren't an exact match for old Stormtroopers anymore what with more wargear restrictions and native deep strike) Detachment, and then a Grey Knights detachment. Then if you wanted to take inducted forces you'd need a separate Guard force. I mean theoretically you could use Scions in a regular Guard detachment to bring it down to 3, but you are then playing them as a worse version of themselves.

As is, if someone wants to play the old Witch Hunters Inquisitorial force you would need to run Inquisition, Imperial Guard Scions again, and Sisters. If this gets broken down even more, it would mean 4 codices and 4 detachments just to have a bare minimum force of what you once were able to do in and of itself.

I like Sisters, I like them a lot and honestly prefer them to much of the Ministorum stuff. I'm also glad that they are getting a melee unit to move with the footsloggers that aren't disgraced Sisters - it is giving more options to the army to play as Sisters that are in good standing with the order. I just don't want to see the book get cut up into fractured pieces like the old Daemonhunters were.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Then I have no recourse but to surmise that you simply don't understand what we're talking about. I see no other possibility here. Sorry you don't get it. *shrugs*

And sorry you don't as well.

 MonkeyBallistic wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i look at older models and wonder how GW ever got big as a company if they made things that looked like that.

That’s because, at the time, most of the competition looked even worse.

To be honest, at the time it was first released, it was actually considered good. Even the good old zombie kit was seen as awesome when it first came out.

These new sisters won't be the exception. We can only compare to what is available at our time, never to what could be in the future.

yukishiro1 wrote:
You can thrust with a two-handed weapon while holding a shield, you cannot swing with one, and she certainly can't use that halberd one-handed. That halberd is completely unusable.

Although you can say 40k isn't supposed to be realistic, it's unusual for them to model something so obviously impossible.

As I have all ready pointed out, this is wrong. You can swing a two handed weapon while equipped with a shield, and was historically done.

Sarouan wrote:
Videos of how soldiers in the medieval times used hallberds are nice and all, but pretty much sure they didn't wear power armours enhancing your strength, nor shields with guns included inside. Hell, as much as I'm concerned, we don't even know how the power weapons are affected with their weight (if your blade is enhanced by a force field, do you really need to use a lot of strength to cut through enemy defenses ?).

Which is why it's pointless to debate about this, really.

First- THIS is a basis of the conversation on Pikes.
These guys are experts in the weapons they are talking about, so you can see a - at minimum, a very basic discussion to give people like you a place to go from to get into the conversation in the first place. Just because you don't know what you talking about, don't fault someone from trying to add in a very basic explanation to further the conversation. I'm trying to help you, even if you don't believe it, because obviously, you don't know what the purpose of the Poke is for in the game here, and the advantage of Sisters of Battle having one. They are armored women, after all. I can see, even if it isn't obvious to you why a woman would have an advantage with a set pike against something like a space marine rolling in fast on them.

Of course, if you want me to get down into some Gangsta' S@@$5, I can oblige you in that as well.

Second- A pole arm in combination with weapons is a very good place to go for something like Sisters of Battle.
The use of the pole arm- power pole arm, laser pole arm, whatever, is a good bolster for a defense in as much as that of the late 15th century, As with the Gustavus evolution of the "Pike and Shot" warfare. Just like the Brits did with the Longbow, You spike in the shield into the ground, spike in the pole arm, and you are ready with a ready made point defense that heavy weapons and bolter firer's can fall behind, as you are getting overrun by Nids, Demons, Whatever..

The Shield and Pike are carried together, not used together. That's why the bottom of the shield is pointed like it is.
I see it in 40K as a very good addition, seeing where the material of the game came from in the first place.

Gustavus Reforms (Squares)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=439NEPZqdxA

Shields (how they carried it)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2NzNSDeAII

Put these together, you can see how they use a Pike and shield.

Ignoring combat roles for a second, these are obviously bodyguard units, and as such may carry these weapons more of a position of title than actual use. You see it throughout medieval Europe as far as guards are concerned. A halberd or other 'long arm" just gives that "guard" look, and that's good enough for me.

As to the other conversation about retinues, witch hunters etc, this is where having friends for pseudo narrative games should come in. It's not really that difficult. Unless practicing for an event with a specific list, I doubt any of my buddies would object to the inclusion of an Inquisitor with a retinue of models that don't actually have official rules for a retinue, but are found elsewhere. On my shelf right now I have Greyfax with a retinue that includes a Crusader, a death cult assassin, 2 arco flagellants, a penitent engine, and pious vane. This looks like an Ordo Herticus retinue, and I have the points I need to field it (although the pen engine would run solo). I feel bad for those that are always constrained by a strict army construction mindset, unless that's just the way you prefer to play.

I was just going to cut the axe bit off and make it a power spear but then I like spear + shield.

 cuda1179 wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
You can thrust with a two-handed weapon while holding a shield, you cannot swing with one, and she certainly can't use that halberd one-handed. That halberd is completely unusable.

Although you can say 40k isn't supposed to be realistic, it's unusual for them to model something so obviously impossible.

As I have all ready pointed out, this is wrong. You can swing a two handed weapon while equipped with a shield, and was historically done.

Please read the words I actually wrote. Hint: you re-wrote them to try to make an easier straw man to knock down.

But even beyond that, I don't really understand what point you think you are making. Of course you can physically strap a shield onto yourself and then use a two-handed weapon. That's obvious. You can strap a ladder onto yourself too if you really want to, or a poodle. Is that shield strapped onto her? No, it isn't. It has also a gun built into it, so quite obviously it is not designed to be strapped, even if you couldn't tell that just from looking at it.

To be clear, I don't think it's a massive deal or anything. It's just dumb. There are other dumb things modeled on GW miniatures, it won't be the first or last time they modeled something dumb. It doesn't need to be a big deal. Ironically it's the people who can't accept someone thinks it's dumb who are making it into a bigger deal than it needs to be.

 MonkeyBallistic wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i look at older models and wonder how GW ever got big as a company if they made things that looked like that.

That’s because, at the time, most of the competition looked even worse.

Also they opened up own stores and really pushed them as hobby driving warhammer and miniatures as synonyms for large public

tneva82 wrote:

 MonkeyBallistic wrote:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:
Sometimes i look at older models and wonder how GW ever got big as a company if they made things that looked like that.

That’s because, at the time, most of the competition looked even worse.

Also they opened up own stores and really pushed them as hobby driving warhammer and miniatures as synonyms for large public

True. I was more thinking about the days before GW shops, before even 1st edition Warhammer. You could go into a shop selling miniatures (usually in the same section as D&D modules) and see minis by several manufacturers, often on the same racks. I’d still go for the Citadel miniatures most of the time because they were the best ones.

 Grot 6 wrote:
blabla on pikes and shield

Like I said, it's pointless. Same debates we had on litterally every "unrealistic weapon / fighting style" in 40k before.

One last thing : the halberd is just one weapon option from these new Celestians. The article mentions they can also be equiped with maces.

Fighting with one handed mace and shield ? Perfectly reasonnable. And this whole debate on halberds being unhandy with shields will be resolved the same way than people putting helmets on their miniatures rather than bare heads : build them that way if you're fine with your suspension of disbelief. So it's even more stupid to moan about it now when you don't even have all the options from the kit showed.

Oh, what if the halberd weapon profile is way more interesting than the maces rulewise ? Well I bet suddenly most of suspensions of disbelief will be more tolerant to that fighting style, in the end. And if it's the maces that are way more optimal with rules...the debate will die its silent death like the others that were utterly and completely useless to have.

Who knows ? Maybe the kit will be made as such it would be possible to remove the shield and say that its added protection given by the rules are actually some kind of force field that could be generated by their backpack, and you can have two hands free for the perfect use of your halberd.

In the end, it's mostly how you want to build your miniatures to fit your suspension of disbelief. It's still modelism, after all, not pre-builded, pre-painted miniatures. Even so, that never stopped people from converting models to suit them more.

Of course, if your real bone here is "but the option exist for anyone to build them with halberds and shield, that's just wrong !!", then it's actually another debate : the fact you can't stand someone else can build their miniatures the way they want that is not fitting your vision of how they should be.

GW reasoning for why halberd instead of spear is pretty easy to follow.

They wanted a polearm wielding bodyguard unit with shield. (Because polearms are instantly associated with the guys protecting the castle and the king)

They could have give them spears, but spears are much simpler, they are also something Grey Knights and Custodes allready use.

Halberds are much more ornate, and have a much more "medieval" look, something GW is looking for new sisters of battle. So halberds it is.

One funny thing about this discussion is that Chaos Warriors have been equipped with halberds + shields since basically ever, and AFAIK still have the option on their current warscroll

 MobileSuitRandom wrote:
One funny thing about this discussion is that Chaos Warriors have been equipped with halberds + shields since basically ever, and AFAIK still have the option on their current warscroll

Spoiler:

Please refrain from posting things that could potentially jeopardise the potential for Dakka to have a 5 page argument over something insignificant...

 MobileSuitRandom wrote:
One funny thing about this discussion is that Chaos Warriors have been equipped with halberds + shields since basically ever, and AFAIK still have the option on their current warscroll

Spoiler:

And thev either had no shield in melee oi like now it's actually spear rather than halberd. They use it like spear rathei than halberd

So comparison is apt as long as halberds on sisters get no shield bonus in melee or punch is weak but longer range. No s bonus, bad ap

tneva82 wrote:


And thev either had no shield in melee oi like now it's actually spear rather than halberd. They use it like spear rathei than halberd

So comparison is apt as long as halberds on sisters get no shield bonus in melee or punch is weak but longer range. No s bonus, bad ap

You'll have plenty of time for that to wait for the rules to actually show up, don't worry. Enough to forget the outrage for another scandalous thing GW will dare to come up with meanwhile.

So, looking beyond the arguments that have been running the past few days, anybody want to share speculation or wishlisting about rules effects of gosh-darned actual power halberds?

I'd love to see them negate the "charger fights first" effect that really plagues Sisters' T3 CC units when receiving a charge and would go a long way towards making them feel tougher without just giving them outrageous, terminator-level saves.

 Grot 6 wrote:
blabla on pikes and shield

A whole bunch of nonsense.

Like I said, I tried to help you, then you pulled that out of your fourth point of contact. At this point, you are tapped yourself out of the conversation, Thanks for playing.

Please do not attach non-wargaming images to your posts. External hosting is fine however.

Kaffis wrote:
So, looking beyond the arguments that have been running the past few days, anybody want to share speculation or wishlisting about rules effects of gosh-darned actual power halberds?

I'd love to see them negate the "charger fights first" effect that really plagues Sisters' T3 CC units when receiving a charge and would go a long way towards making them feel tougher without just giving them outrageous, terminator-level saves.

Fight first would be an odd ability on a weapon. But it would certainly make them an interesting option as a unit

Kaffis wrote:
So, looking beyond the arguments that have been running the past few days, anybody want to share speculation or wishlisting about rules effects of gosh-darned actual power halberds?

Depends on whether GW are moving away from their 8th edition habits. A year or two back if you asked me what I though power halberds would do i'd have guessed they would be required to use the new 'hold the line' stratagem and not much beyond that.

I'd guess that at the very least they're probably Power Axes, but with Damage 2.
EDIT: wait, I forgot that they're meant to be Blessed weapons, so they'll proably also be S+3 instead of +2

I don't think the new celestian weapons will be on the same level than the canoness' blessed blade just because there is the word "blessed" in it. They're talking about blessed maces as well.

EDIT : by that, I mean they'll have the same current profile, but I agree I may be totally wrong on that point here.

To me, the point of giving them other names is to make a different profile from "generic" power weapons the Imperium has. So I expect they will be slightly different.

Otherwise, they'll still be celestians so I don't think they will be tremendously powerful. I'm expecting a bit like Zephyrim's level but with more strength and a different AP depending if it's maces and halberds. "Blessed" could be also a keyword for some mechanism / stratagem in the codex, or have a special rule on it, or just nothing.

Main difference will certainly be the shield's effect. Honestly, I'm expecting they will have a 4++ save. Don't think they will really need an improved profile in comparison to "normal" celestians, the existing one is already perfect for close combat units with good equipment.