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Ok, we often grumble that GW don't get round to releasing Codexes and Armybooks within the lifecycle of one edition, so imagine if they decided to cut back on the number of books, which ones would you be prepared to lose?

You can choose 9 Codexes for 40K and 9 Army Books for Fantasy. Allowing for 1 release every two months, alternating between Fantasy and 40K, this would enable them to complete a cycle within 3 years (the usual lifespan of an edition). You add new books if you choose, but remember no more than 9 books per system.

My 40K choices would be...

1. Space Marines - Chapter Tactics would be used to differentiate between each Chapter with a number of SCs for the bigger chapters
2. Imperial Guard
3. Eldar
4. Tyranids
5. Chaos Marines - This would of course see Chaos Marines and Daemons together in one volume again
6. Necrons
7. Tau
8. Sisters of Battle
9. Angels of Death - One book is easily sufficient to cover Blood Angels and Dark Angels. Space Wolves can stay on Fenris and get blind stupid drunk.

No Orks? Nope, my 40K universe would try to avoid obvious comparrisons to Fantasy, so I've chosen the races that are the most sci fi in nature. No Dark Eldar either, I don't think their fluff is really going anywhere. Grey Knights would be an Elite Choice in the Space Marine book.

As for Fantasy...

1. Orcs and Goblins
2. Empire
3. Undead - Bored of Vampires now, I want Nagash back! This book would focus on Necromancers and Liches with none of the super combat characters that are currently robbing Undead players of a tactical challenge
4. Skaven - One of the few non-tolkien rip off races in Fantasy and my favourite, so they're staying.
5. High Elves
6. Wood Elves - Yes, Asrai or Druchii? I've gone for the former, because GW have never really achieved anything worthwhile with Dark Elves
7. Dwarves - Was tempted to say they were eaten by Tyranids, but they are one of the necessary Fantasy archetypes.
8. Chaos Warriors - One giant tome full of Chaos Dwarves, Beastmen, Daemons, Giants, Ogres. Oh and Chaos Warriors.
9. Lizardmen - Another one of GW's genuinely cool concepts. Be a shame to ditch them.

So, no Bretonnians as they are just another human race on horses. No Ogre Kingdoms (silly idea) and sadly no Tomb Kings (though I might allow a side list in the Undead book).

Over to you...

Exclusion of the Orks in 40k is rather criminal.

No Orks? Nope, my 40K universe would try to avoid obvious comparrisons to Fantasy

You have problem with space orcs, but space elves are ok?


I would put SOB an GK in one inquisition book

Undead - Bored of Vampires now, I want Nagash back! This book would focus on Necromancers and Liches with none of the super combat characters that are currently robbing Undead players of a tactical challenge

+1

Seriously? You would drop Orks and Dark Eldar but still give Differently Painted Marines their own book?

I would definetly drop a number of extra marine chapters. I don't see why Dark Angels or Black Templars need an extra book. Hell, just put every Marine in one book. It would have to be VERY customisable though.

Space Marines
Imperial Guard
Orks
Tyranids
Eldar
Necrons
Tau
Sisters
Chaos

I'm not quite sure where to put the rest of the Inquisition stuff though. Grey Knight armies always rubbed me the wrong way, but you should be able to field them in a Guard army just as well as with other Marines.


Don't play much Fantasy, though I do play them myself, I never understood how Ogres got their own book.

No orks? I think they're too important for that, fluff wise.

Angels of Death is a good idea though, they should return to it.

I also like the fantasy undead idea.

A little modification of Anung Un Rama's list:

Space Marines
Imperial Guard
Orks
Tyranids
Eldar
Necrons
Tau
Inquisition
Chaos

Also I'd made sure that the diversity of units in Tyranids, Tau, and Orks matched that of the Space Marines, Imperial Guard, Inquisition, Chaos, and Eldar.

Sig says it all.

Marine - All chapters w/IC for different variation
Spiky Marine - LatD, Marines, Corsairs, Demons
Manufactorum of Man - Guard, SoB, GK, Inquisitors, Ad Mech, etc.
Elf/Spiky Elf - Why do they need two if it's the same race?
Ork - GIVE ME BACK MY CLANS!!!!!
Nid - Variation with Nids?
Tau - With this codex alone you could introduce many outlandish aliens, but alas the minds of GW
Necron - Just because I suppose. I actually like the newer fluff, just make the army playable.

With Fantasy, I agree there are plenty of HUMANS (Marines) too:

Armies of Men - Any of the kingdom armies, dwarven allies.
Undead - How many do you need? Again, if you want themes, introduce them through Hero/Lords.
Mercenaries! - Give me my Mercs BACK! This could be your Ogres, Corsairs, Intro races.
Elves - Really,,, we need three books?
Orks and Goblins - get rid of animosity, give us more FANATICS.
Lizards - Dino-riders galore
Skaven - really like the new models
Chaos - All types.

Notice the lack of DWARVES. Really, this needs explanation? Add them to the Mercs or additions to chaos.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Fantasy in general lacks the depth of 40k just because the Old World is pre-determined. How many races have been fighting for how many years and no one seems to be able to beat anyone?

The old world is as big as the Moon and no one seems to be able to gain an upper-hand?

For 40k, I would put

1) Space Marines. Drop combat tactics, but allow everyone to choose 1 special rule to give their army. For example, Ultras get Combat tactics, Salamanders get to twin-link burny stuff, Crimson fists are stubborn, Raven Gaurd get hit-and-run, Blood Angels get Furious Charge. Also, allow generic captains to make some specialization of you list. E.g. if they have jump packs, asault marines become troops, if they have bikes bikers become troops. Special Characters would allow you to alter your army, but in a manner more oriented towards "fluff" and less towards making a working army. For examle, Astorath or Lemartes would allow you to upgrade troops units to Death company, Dante would allow Vangaurd Vets to take Artificer armour (Sanguinary Gaurd), Deathwing and Ravenwing guys would allow you to take Termies and Ravenwing stuff as troops, and so on.

2) Gaurd. Cant do without these generic redshirts.

3) Forces of the Imperium. Contain rules for the Inquisition, Ecclessiarchy, Officio Assasanorum. If there is space, Ad Mech. Allow some sort of Allies system.

4) Chaos. Combining both Daemons and Marines. Daemons behavior depends on what sort of characters you have in your army. Princes or Sorcerers allow you to use them like the current summoned Demons rules (With actual Daemons), While Heralds or Greater Daemons allow you to use the Daemonic Assault rules like the Daemon Codex.

5) Orks. Allow rules for different tribes.

6) Eldar. Craftworlds! Also, include rules allowing Dark Eldar in the Book.

7) Tyranids, the last of the easy canidates. Bring Back Biomorphs.

8)+9) Tau and Necrons, because unlike any Space marine Flavours that I forgot, it would be extremely unfair to just drop the armies.

40k:

Space Marines - characters, captians, or chapter masters can take a Chapter rule which adds special rules or units to an army, kind of like Vulkan currently
Imperial Guard
Eldar
Tyranids
Chaos - marines, daemons, and traitor ally rules (enables chaos-tainted units from some other codexes, IG and Eldar for example. Eldar units would lose any exarch abilities in exchange for a mark or something more drastic)
Necrons
Tau
Inquisition
Adeptus Mechanicus - split into Imperial and Dark factions. Chaos, IG, SM, and Inquisition have access as allies

Fantasy:

Orcs and Goblins
Lands of Men - Empire and Bretonnia together. Leaders give access to units and rules like in 40k
Undead
Skaven
Elves
Dark Elves
Dwarves
Chaos - additional rules supplement. Modifies units from other races to represent Chaos embraces and taints all. Truly chaotic warbands would result.
Lizardmen

Fantasy would be harder, as it is a lot less saturated with a single army type (Sace Marines!). Still, I will have a go.

1) Empire
2) Dwarves
3) Orcs+Goblins
4) High Elves
5) Lizardmen
6) Skaven
7) Dark Elves
8) Undead (Condensed Tomb Kings and Vamp Counts)
9) Chaos (Condense all 3)
10) Wood Elves
11) Ogre Kingdoms
12) Brettonia

In short, I just feel that Fantasy has to many factions that make no sense to condense together from Fluff perspective, asd well as having drastically different combat styles. Still, the above would result in a 20% decrease in number of army books.

Only 9? No modification of Nurglitch's list!

Thing is, I have no problem with GW having lots of Codices, and some of them going without updates for a decade at a stretch. I think GW should continue with the de facto Tiers of Codices, with major armies that always get updated (SM, IG, CSM, & Xenos), minor forces that skip an edition before being updated, and named forces that skip *at least* one edition before being updated:

Tier 1 (updated each edition):
- Space Marines
- Imperial Guard
- Chaos
- Eldar
- Necrons
- Orks
- Tau
- Tyranids

Tier 2 (updated alternate editions):
- Inquisition
- Sisters of Battle
- Daemons
- Legions
- Lost & Damned
- Ad Mech
- Squats

Tier 3 (updated alternate editions, at best):
- Black Templars
- Blood Angels
- Dark Angels
- Space Wolves
- Dark Eldar

I completely fail to see why we need more frequent army updates as long as the rules are compatible.

Here's what I think 40k should be.

1. Ultramarines
2. Dark Angels
3. Blood Angels
4. Space Wolves
5. White Scars
6. Imperial Fists
7. Black Templars
8. Salamanders
9. Ogre Kingdom

Flashman wrote:Ok, we often grumble that GW don't get round to releasing Codexes and Armybooks within the lifecycle of one edition, so imagine if they decided to cut back on the number of books, which ones would you be prepared to lose?

You can choose 9 Codexes for 40K and 9 Army Books for Fantasy. Allowing for 1 release every two months, alternating between Fantasy and 40K, this would enable them to complete a cycle within 3 years (the usual lifespan of an edition). You add new books if you choose, but remember no more than 9 books per system.

My 40K choices would be...

1. Space Marines - Chapter Tactics would be used to differentiate between each Chapter with a number of SCs for the bigger chapters
2. Imperial Guard
3. Eldar
4. Tyranids
5. Chaos Marines - This would of course see Chaos Marines and Daemons together in one volume again
6. Necrons
7. Tau
8. Sisters of Battle
9. Angels of Death - One book is easily sufficient to cover Blood Angels and Dark Angels. Space Wolves can stay on Fenris and get blind stupid drunk.

No Orks? Nope, my 40K universe would try to avoid obvious comparrisons to Fantasy, so I've chosen the races that are the most sci fi in nature. No Dark Eldar either, I don't think their fluff is really going anywhere. Grey Knights would be an Elite Choice in the Space Marine book.

As for Fantasy...

1. Orcs and Goblins
2. Empire
3. Undead - Bored of Vampires now, I want Nagash back! This book would focus on Necromancers and Liches with none of the super combat characters that are currently robbing Undead players of a tactical challenge
4. Skaven - One of the few non-tolkien rip off races in Fantasy and my favourite, so they're staying.
5. High Elves
6. Wood Elves - Yes, Asrai or Druchii? I've gone for the former, because GW have never really achieved anything worthwhile with Dark Elves
7. Dwarves - Was tempted to say they were eaten by Tyranids, but they are one of the necessary Fantasy archetypes.
8. Chaos Warriors - One giant tome full of Chaos Dwarves, Beastmen, Daemons, Giants, Ogres. Oh and Chaos Warriors.
9. Lizardmen - Another one of GW's genuinely cool concepts. Be a shame to ditch them.

So, no Bretonnians as they are just another human race on horses. No Ogre Kingdoms (silly idea) and sadly no Tomb Kings (though I might allow a side list in the Undead book).

Over to you...

Hmmm...

First of all, regulate some of the fluff to WD, instead of the codices, and give the magazine some fictional reading crunch.

Drop Chaos Daemons or make them elites for CSM.

Drop Inq...or at least combine them into a single book.

As suggested, make GK an elite choice for IG/SM.

Sad to say, merge the SM books into one and differentiate the chapters with a few rules and SC's (kind of like what the OP suggested).

Merge CWE and DE into one book with special rules in playing one or the other.

I think that brings us to eight codices?

SM
Eldar
Tau
Necrons
Tyranids
Orks
CSM
IG

Leaving Orks out is suicide.

Since I only play 40k, here's my list; these would be beefier books though, as they contain more stuff:
1. Space Marines and more codex chapters like Dark and Blood Angels
2. Chaos Marines, Daemons, and cults
3. Codex Imperialis (Guard, Inquisition, elements of the Adeptus Mechanicus, arbites, etc.)
4. Eldar - raiders, exodites, pirates/Dark Eldar
5. Orks
6. Tau and allies - fit in more of the races like Hrud and such
7. Tyranids
8. Divergent Marines, such as the Black Templars and Wolves
9. Necrons, but I could care less about them.

avantgarde wrote:Here's what I think 40k should be.

1. Ultramarines
2. Dark Angels
3. Blood Angels
4. Space Wolves
5. White Scars
6. Imperial Fists
7. Black Templars
8. Salamanders
9. Ogre Kingdom

Haha

Compress the Space Marines into one big Codex or make the expansions just that... expansions. Space Wolves took as much time to develop and release as a whole new army of any other race! Black Templars aren't even all that different... just change names and add characters, and you're set. Same with Dark Angels, really. They're just not different enough to merit time and capital expenditure that could go into diversifying the game. While Space Marines are good sellers, you need variety to attract a wide range of players.

Codex: Inquisition. The different branches wouldn't be averse to working together and both can use Guard forces, so why the hell not?

Codex: Chaos. The Chaos Marines, Daemons, and traitors. Seeing as traitorous humans and cultists show up so much in fiction, why not give them some face-time in an army book? And, as the three would often mix on the battlefield, it would be easy to put all of them in one big book and let players mix-n'-match freely instead of making them fiddle with allies.

avantgarde wrote:Here's what I think 40k should be.

1. Ultramarines
2. Dark Angels
3. Blood Angels
4. Space Wolves
5. White Scars
6. Imperial Fists
7. Black Templars
8. Salamanders
9. Ogre Kingdom

I was just waiting to see this while scrolling down the page. Anyway, my lists.
40k:
1. Space Marines- All in One
2. The Imperium- IG, SoB and GK in one
3. The Eldar- Both Kinds
4. Chaos- Marines, Daemons, LatD
5. Necrons
6. Orks
7. Tau
8. Tyranids
9. Mercenaries- Kroot, Vespids, ect

Fantasy:
1. Men- Empire and Brettonia
2. Elves- High, Wood and Dark
3. Undead- VC and TK
4. Chaos- Warriors and Daemons
5. Beasts- Beastmen and Skaven
6. Ogres
7. Orcs and Goblins
8. Lizardmen
9. Mercenaries- Like Giants and Rogues

Note how my lists include all the armies.

I only play 40k,and much like Brother SRM and Tim my codices would be much larger (more encompising) books...so here goes.

1. Space Marines- All major chapters + means to talior your own.
2. Chaos-Legions,Daemons,LATD,+means to talior your own varient chapters & renegades.
3. Orkz-Klanz,Freebooters + means to customize your own forces.
4.Eldar-all Eldar are coverd.
5. The Imperium-SOB,,Daemon Hunters,GK all things not SM & IG are here.
6.Imperial Guard-covers all varients of IG + Traitor Guard(maybe)
7. Tau-I know absolutely nada about Tau,but this book would cover everything a Tau player wants.
8.Tyranids-Ditto.
9.Necrons.

Just to be "that guy" before someone beats me to it:
1. Ultramarines
2. Dark Angels
3. Blood Angels
4. Space Wolves
5. Black Templars
6. Salamanders
7. Ravenguard
8. Blood Ravens
9. White Scars

Fantasy should have:
1. Ultramarines......

ok Fantasy just gets one army.
and its from another game.

BRING ON THE HATE

ARGH! someone did beat me to it! nuts

whalemusic360 wrote:Just to be "that guy"

Too slow, and too obvious...

If it's all SMs, all the time, try this:
1. Ultramarines
2. Dark Angels
3. Blood Angels
4. Space Wolves
5. Black Templars
6. Grey Knights
7. Salamanders
8. White Scars
9. Raven Guard

I mean, Blood Ravens over Grey Knights? Really? For shame!

1: Codex: Adeptus Astartes... Every SM codex in one book.
2: Codex: Ordo Imperialis... WH, DH,
3: Codex: Imperial Army.... Include special rules for the major IG regiment types for added varity
4: Codex: Ancients......... Eldar and Dark Eldar... plus craftworld eldar
5: Codex: Ork...........To include Feral orks
6: Codex: Nids.......... om nom nom nom
7: Codex: Necrons.....
8: Codex: Tau
9: Codex: The Fallen..... CSM 3.5 redux +Daemons

That joke isn't funny anymore...

Why everyone try to put Empire + Bretonnia or all elves in one book, and still leave Ogres as regular army book? when Ogres were relased, that was the main reason for me to drop Warhammer. This and Vampires.

Why you ask? Because Empire and Bretonnia are men, so that's a no-brainer. And Elves are Elves no matter what path they follow.

If you limit it to 9 then:

Marines (all flavours)
Guard (including Skitarii)
Imperium (Inquisition, Rogue Traders)
Chaos (CSM, Daemons, rules to allow allies from Guard book)
Eldar (craftworld, exodite and dark)
Orks (klans, freebooterz, feral)
Necrons
Tyranids
Tau (full empire book including Kroot, Vespid, Nicassar and Demiurg)

Not sure on fantasy.

Nightlords
Iron warriors
Alpha legion
Word bearers
World eaters
Death Guard
1k Sons
Emperor's children
Black legion

Fantasy

Suns of horus
Luna wolves

I know!

40K:
Everything you can fit in here. I want a fething codex for every Ork clan, Space Marine Chapter (INCLUDING MY ONW) Eldar Craftworld, etc., and I will campaign actively for it!

In all seriousness, I'll just keep it how it is.

I would go with:
40k:
1) Space marines
2) Orks
3) Imperial Guard
4) Eldar (both flavours, but no inter-mingling)
5) Chaos (Marines and daemons in one book)
6) Inquisition (Witch Hunters, Daemon Hunters and Xenos Hunters)
7) Tau
8) Necrons
9) Tyranids

Fantasy:
1) Orcs, Goblins and Ogres (plenty of mingling allowed, but options to create one-race armies)
2) Chaos (North-men and daemons all under one roof)
3) Realms of man (essentially Empire and Brettonians in one book)
4) Elves of light (High elves and Wood elves, but no mingling)
5) Dark elves
6) The ancients (Lizardmen, but with a cooler name)
7) Dwarves
8) Undead (Tomb kings, vampire counts all in one book. Some mingling)
9) Beasts (Beasts of chaos and skaven)

This way, you include more or less everything, but cut down on the number of books, making the updates more feasible

S_P

Strictly from a 40k and idealised viewpoint I would keep:

1. Eldar - Weepy Eldar, Spiky Eldar and exodites in one volume
2. Orks - Including clans and oddboyz
3. Tau- Including rules for auxilary humans
4. Chaos- Renegade legions, Traitor Guard, Cultists, Daemons
5. Tyranids - Including rules for stealer cults
6. Imperial Guard - Including some FW variant rules.
7. Forces of the Imperium - SOB, the various Ordos, including rules for Ad Mech.
8. Bertie Botts every flavour marines.

No necrons in my world, I used to like them but they do feel like a one trick pony.