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 jasper76 wrote:
Orks. They're boring as all hell. Modeling-wise they suck, because you can't convert anything.

???

Probably Imperial Knights. I love the models and I would love to bring one along with my Ultramarines and Guard, but I don't think they need to be their own army

 Nevelon wrote:
The cost of rulebooks being a bar to play is another hot button (and one reason I’d like to see fewer) I pay far, far to much for rules, where I’d rather be investing in minis. Frankly GW would get more of my money if they gave the rules away for free, but that’s a discussion for another thread.

But melding the two together is a far cry from going to the size of the SM codex.

80 pages for Skitarii and 80 for Cult Mechanicus.
40 pages shy of the size of Space Marines(200 pages), but still larger than all the other books beyond Space Marines and Eldar.

Put together there are 14 different AdMech units (looking at GW’s site and filtering out all the painting guides, bundles, etc). I’ll admit to not playing the armies, but that still seems low for a full book, and quite a distance from all the options in the SM codex. I think they could do justice to the force in a “normal” sized book.

You have "14 different units" between two books for an entirely new faction. Additionally, the armies composing that faction don't have all of their slots filled. Skitarii have no HQ options and Cult Mechanicus have no Fast Attack options. Neither of them have Special Characters(which for some books largely inflate the unit counts).


And it's not like there aren't other armies which are sitting right around that "14 different unit" number. Tau, for example, have "16 different units"--three of which(the Ghostkeel, Breacher Teams, and Stormsurge) just got added in recently.

And while people who want to play pure skitarii can get away with the $33, people who want to do a combined AdMech force would have to shell out $66, rather then the $50 most people pay. To be honest, I didn’t realize the price for the AdMech factions was that low. I thought they were full, or almost full, priced like the rest.

Okay, and?
If you want to play Eldar and Dark Eldar, you're looking at $107.50 or Imperial Guard and Militarum Tempestus you're looking at $82(it WOULD be more if the main book wasn't softcover now) or other combinations of these kinds of things.

Hell, to play the new Cadian Detachment? You're looking at $115($74 for Mont'ka and $41 for Guard).

Doing any kind of "Allied" force(which is what both books would be; there's no rules for fielding them as a single army with a Techpriest as HQ and Skitarii as his Troops) is going to be expensive.

Being able to play a sub-set of an army (like an all-scout list) should be supported more, but often isn’t. But I’d rather have more options in one book and be able to choose what to use, rather then having to buy multiple books to assemble my force.
Opinions vary, so YMMV.

But that's the rub.
Skitarii and Cult Mechanicus are standalone armies. You do not need to have both in order to use them, nor do you need to have Knights in the book like someone suggested.

There's a Formation that has become hugely popular from White Dwarf because of what it does(makes a tiny Cult Mechanicus detachment into a FAR more efficient thing for the points you pay) which includes all three, and people have claimed was clearly intended to screw over customers because of the timing of the release.

 Wulfmar wrote:

 Madoch1 wrote:
I'm just wondering. Honestly i'd get rid of Tzeentch. He just seems real boring fluff wise in my opinion.

Well, you're welcome to your opinion....

Tzeentch, the God of plotting, schemes and change. The God of betrayal who was one of the, if not THE orchestrator behind the Horus Heresy - compared to one dimensional Khone 'Moar Skulls', Nurgle 'Candida albicans is my favourite yeast' and Slaanesh 'One in the bum, no harm done'.

but sure...

*BLAM BLAM BLAM*


Personally, I'd like to see Sisters as a force either done properly, or binned - none of this crippled half-life existence as a metal only White Dwarf army.

Otherwise - Tau, just because they belong to Infinity more than 40K (imo, I know they have a large fanbase)

Oh crap i put tzeentch. I meant slaanesh. Or at the very least remake his/her/its daemons.

Khorne is ok. Fluff boring yes. Names repetitive yes. general lack of being useless in combat yes. ........ eh maybe update him a bit as well. But his daemons look cool

I'd like to see nearly every variant marine codex go.

Loyalist marines of all colours should have one book. Chaos get another. Done.

...I like how people complain about Imperial Knights being an army. Come on people that army of 5 knights dont win maelstrom.

what you really need to complain about are the Wraith Knights. 5 Wraith Knights in a 1850 list with WK only occupying 1500pts.

You think 5 IK are hard to fight? Try 5 WK without enough grav guns.

I'd like to see Knights go away as a standalone army, and just be a 0-1 addition for other Imperial armies, but I don't think that will happen at this point.

I'd really like to see all the loyalist SM chapters consolidated into a single book, with the exception of the Grey Knights (who I'd really like to see as part of a combined Inquisition book). Truth be told, SW's and BA's and DA's can be handled by Chapter Tactics and an extra couple of pages each without losing anything they might not expect to lose with a simple edition changeover.

As much as I like the concept of an all Stormtrooper IG army, the Militarum Tempestus book can probably go away. The army could be constructed from within the IG codex with a page or two of extra rules, and quite frankly the MT books fluff is probably amongst the worst ever put out by GW, it's truly reminiscent of awful internet fanfic (much like Space Wolves and Kaldor Draigo), and the army just plays like garbage unfortunately.

Sisters. Do them justice or just drop them.

For the person who said you can't convert Orks, that has to be one of the falsest statements I've every heard. Orks basic units can be made into anything, and between all the fantasy kits you can make some really unique things. Not to mention the infinite nature of LOOTING other factions stuff.

I loath to Invalidate Minis since no one should have their money and hard work taken away but I never liked that grey knights were a full army. They are the rarest of the rare and them showing up in force to fight things other than demons doesn't make much sense.

Game wise, Imperial Knights.

Universe wise, Space Wolves. They need to die in a fire. A blue tzeenchy fire.

 vipoid wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Them being released as not one book but two separate ones was actually the BEST way they could do it.
People who want to run the Cult Mechanicus side of things(the Servitors and Combat Robots) can do so without touching the Skitarii side of things and vice versa.

Yeah, because people couldn't possibly have just elected to not use Skitarii or Cult Mechanicus units from their codex.

So you would rather pay twice as much for a combined codex that you were only using half of?

Yeah, sounds like a GREAT idea to me!

(Not really)

What about all the people who want to use both and are currently forced to pay more?

To add to vipoid's note, why also would such a combined book also have to be twice as expensive? They certainly didn't double the cost of C:SM when they folded in C:Black Templars.

Skitarii and Cult Mechanicus are one army, Skitarii were never seen as distinct from anything else in the Mechanicus until GW's release a few months ago, which seem to be largely for business reasons. They even have formations that combine them into a single army post-facto. There's no good reason for them to be two distinct armies.

 vipoid wrote:
What about all the people who want to use both and are currently forced to pay more?

It would be a $58 book.

With sales tax figured in, there's an $8 difference between a $58 book and two $33 books.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
To add to vipoid's note, why also would such a combined book also have to be twice as expensive? They certainly didn't double the cost of C:SM when they folded in C:Black Templars.

How much of Codex: Black Templars was actually unique to that book?
Three characters and a single unit.

Skitarii and Cult Mechanicus are one army, Skitarii were never seen as distinct from anything else in the Mechanicus until GW's release a few months ago, which seem to be largely for business reasons. They even have formations that combine them into a single army post-facto. There's no good reason for them to be two distinct armies.

And up until that release, Skitarii were anything from combat servitors with guns hardwired into them to humans with cybernetic implants to rather large hulking figures with heavy weapons grafted onto them.

There wasn't really a "Skitarii are this thing" beyond them being the military might of the Mechanicus.

I'd lvoe to see Knights get rolled into the apocalypse book, or a campiagn book, and all the supplements seem a little over the top, the FOC alterations were a better way to go. supplements should just be in the codexes themselves, GW are the tabletope EA; "here have a $84 book, then pay another $50ish for the dlc that should have come with it in the first place.

 vipoid wrote:
What about all the people who want to use both and are currently forced to pay more?

I didn't say some sort of solution to that issue isn't a thing that needs to happen, as I agree that not having to buy 2 codexes if you want to do that would suck. But also it would suck for the people who would suddenly have to buy a more expensive codex if they did not plan on doing a combined army to some degree. Basically they screwed it up by making two seperate codexes in the first place.

... None? Honestly, these threads always turn out really ugly. I get an army not being your personal taste, but does that really mean you'd want to completely ditch them, despite all their fans? Seems needlessly tribalistic to me.

Ceaser wrote:
Fluff wise, any faction could completely wipe out the tau in a heart beat if they focused on it for.. A few days, maybe?

Well actually, "fluff wise" that's not true, since we literally just had a campaign book come out where a faction genuinely tried to wipe them out and it didn't quite work out that way. Much to the chagrin of Tau haters everywhere, I imagine.

Ceaser wrote:
Also, they aren't fun to play, or to play against.

That's GW's fault. And lots of armies in 40k aren't fun to play with or against, not just Tau, and that's because GW either doesn't know what it's doing or just doesn't care. Tau could be a fun army if they wanted them to be.

Ceaser wrote:
It's probably the worst army that gw has thought of. Replace them with squats, and the masses will be happier for it.

I wouldn't be, because I've spent a feth ton of time and money on Tau models that I wouldn't be able to use anymore. And they're not the worst army GW has thought of...that would be Squats. Which, ironically, if they ever were to make their long-awaited comeback, it would probably be as the Demiurg allies of the Tau.

nudibranch wrote:
... None? Honestly, these threads always turn out really ugly. I get an army not being your personal taste, but does that really mean you'd want to completely ditch them, despite all their fans? Seems needlessly tribalistic to me.

The only right answer. These threads are pointless and just cause a lot of trouble for no reason.

I like Tau because they show that even as mans time may be at an end, chaos just winning isn't the only answer. Just as Man's rise was helped by the fall of the eldar, if Mankind can hold out long enough Tau might be able to grow into something.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
To add to vipoid's note, why also would such a combined book also have to be twice as expensive? They certainly didn't double the cost of C:SM when they folded in C:Black Templars.

How much of Codex: Black Templars was actually unique to that book?
Three characters and a single unit.

Which isn't much more than there is to the Mechanicus or Skitarii...

The Mechanicus has what, 6 units in total including characters, 4 really if you don't count different flavors of electro priests and Kataphrons as completely distinct units?

Skitarii have 7 units? 5 if you consider Vanguard/Rangers and Ruststalkers/Infiltrators as relatively simple variants?

At the outside, you're talking 13 units in total, made from just 9 kits?

Skitarii and Cult Mechanicus are one army, Skitarii were never seen as distinct from anything else in the Mechanicus until GW's release a few months ago, which seem to be largely for business reasons. They even have formations that combine them into a single army post-facto. There's no good reason for them to be two distinct armies.

And up until that release, Skitarii were anything from combat servitors with guns hardwired into them to humans with cybernetic implants to rather large hulking figures with heavy weapons grafted onto them.

And it just goes further to show that there is no distinction between these armies, because the latter sound exactly like Kataphrons.

Ceaser wrote:
Tau. They don't fit. In a world of grim darkness, they feel... Out of place. There is nothing grim dark, or scary, about them.

Err, lol? Maybe you should have paid more attention history class then, to understand why the Tau are so scary. Here's a phrase to get you started on your research: manifest destiny.

The Tau's fluff is arguably grim dark, it's just not as obvious as the rest of the factions. The Tau's fluff is far more subtle in its' grim darkness, with things like mind-control, and other things being implied rather than outright stated.

I think the Tau are mainly just...mishandled, like most other 40k fluff of late.

I like the idea of them as the representation of the tiny Xenos race that the Imperium fights across the galaxy and that periodically rise and fall, and that is slowly realizing the shitstorm its wading into.

I also really like the aspect where they show up and say "well...you can join the Greater Good...or we can bomb you from orbit and kill you all". The darker, Orwellian side to them has some merits.

The problem is that most of their fluff, particularly post 4E fluff, is written...abysmally.

It's not unique to the Tau. The Tempestus book, Space Wolves, GK's, and other armies suffer terribly from this. However, they have some very solid older fluff to stand on from earlier editions that's actually quite good. The Tau however don't have as much of that, and what there is isn't as widely read.

I believe strongly in the principle of not duplicating code while writing a program. It creates better programs that are easier to update. The same holds true for codexes. Duplicating the same rules in multiple codexes is bad, since you will have to update them all at the same time to keep them consistent.

It might sound strange but, the creation of the smaller codexes like the harlequin or the knight codex are one of the best tings gw has ever done. Now you they can update any eldar or imperial book without the risk of creating different versions of the same unit of harlequins or knights.

I would love it if they also reduced the rule duplication in the different marine books. Codex blood angels, Dark angels, space wolves etc. should not duplicate shared parts of the space marine codex. Instead they should reference to those rules and only mention the changes.

The other thing GW should do is fix chaos. GW's rule approach for them is just a messy set duplicated interacting rule sets. Any programmer writing code in the same manner should have been fired a long time ago.

I wouldn't exactly let them "Go" per-se, as what's added all has potential. It's just that GW has basically ran the game system into the ground with their lack of care of the rules beyond codex releases.

However, I do want to see some changes that would probably streamline a few things:

First off, all Space Marines (with the exception of the Grey Knights) are rolled into one Codex, with Chapter Tactics taking over splitting up the Chapters (BAs and DAs can easily be done this way). Any chapter-specific Units would be like the BT Crusader Squads, locked behind their Chapter Tactics (or equipment being locked behind it, like Helfrost weapons). While there are indeed a lot of units between the four SM codexes, this in the longrun is a lot shorter and simpler. The padding is mainly from the Special Characters, which I will get to later.

The IG/AM codex and AdMech dexes remain the same, with the caveat that the AdMech dexes are finally rolled into one book, like they should have been at the beginning.

Finally, the Militarium Tempestus, Sisters of Battle, Grey Knights, Officio Assassinorium, and perhaps the Legion of the Damned are rolled into a singular "Agents of the Imperium" codex. This gives them the ability to be run as individual armies or help supplement each other's drawbacks (GKs would supplement the SoB's lack of heavy-armored Terminators, Psykers and CC troops. Inquisitors would bring in heavy weapons, and so on). The Imperial Knights should be rolled in here too, to fulfill their "obligitory big LoW" section.

Chaos should reform to become one Codex again, as well as with the introduction of Renegade Guard into 40k proper. This would be one big book of "Legions of Chaos" and allow players to either field Renegade Guard armies, SM armies, Daemon armies, or a mix of any of the three. It should also make mono-gods more viable since you can combine the marines, daemon and renegade guards to back up eachother's drawbacks. Also Chaos Knights should be the LoW in this one as well.

Just get rid of everything and start over; WH40k 2.0, and give it to someone else then those goons and idiots from Design studio...

Tau. Flat out boring mechanics, boring play style, boring fluff, and boring aesthetics. Normally big robots make me happy, but these guys are just lame.

 jreilly89 wrote:
Tau. Flat out boring mechanics, boring play style, boring fluff, and boring aesthetics. Normally big robots make me happy, but these guys are just lame.

Thank you! Gundam? Yes please. Gurru laggan? I'll take it. Tau? Please discontinue.

 jasper76 wrote:
Orks. They're boring as all hell. Modeling-wise they suck, because you can't convert anything. Painting-wise, they're nothing but bright green with red everywhere like a non-stop Christmas brunch. Their rules are too predictable, they're completely mono-build, and you never see anyone having fun with them, either playing with them or playing against them.

2/10 because someone fell for it.

 War Kitten wrote:
The Tau's fluff is arguably grim dark, it's just not as obvious as the rest of the factions. The Tau's fluff is far more subtle in its' grim darkness, with things like mind-control, and other things being implied rather than outright stated.

If the Tau come to your planet, you have to join them.... because of the implication.