Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 KiloFiX wrote:
All they need to do is give Reivers “power knives” and they will be in again.

They have them in the dark Imperium novel. When Felix leads the strike into the hive here’s a description of them as power weapons, glimmering with disruption fields.

 Stux wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

 Stux wrote:

kingheff wrote:
I played a unit of five with both the chutes and grapnel last night in a cities of death game. Coming in on turn three to root out a squad of havoc's perched on a ruin, nine inches away but only a three inch charge because of the grapnel.
Reivers are situational but nothing else in the marine arsenal can do what they do.

Grapnels don't work while charging these days, only in the movement phase. Got nerfed a little while back :(

It was like they're one cool little niche, stripped away...

...because of a different unit getting abused in a soup. Le sigh.

Weirdly though, it wasn't directly that FAQ that affected Reivers, as Reivers don't have fly. It came in a slightly later FAQ, specifically targeting Reivers.

I tend to give GW the benefit of the doubt on a lot of things, but this was a real head scratched for me!

It's all related, though. GW wanted to remove the ability to Deepstrike and have a charge of less than 9" for most troops. They actually did the same for Necron Wraiths and a couple of other "not quite Fly" rules, but forgot Reivers and GK Interceptors so had to go back and add the restrictions to them afterwards. So for a very brief moment GK actually had a squad that was more powerful than some of it's compatriots in other SM Codices. Very briefly.

Slipspace wrote:

 Stux wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

 Stux wrote:

kingheff wrote:
I played a unit of five with both the chutes and grapnel last night in a cities of death game. Coming in on turn three to root out a squad of havoc's perched on a ruin, nine inches away but only a three inch charge because of the grapnel.
Reivers are situational but nothing else in the marine arsenal can do what they do.

Grapnels don't work while charging these days, only in the movement phase. Got nerfed a little while back :(

It was like they're one cool little niche, stripped away...

...because of a different unit getting abused in a soup. Le sigh.

Weirdly though, it wasn't directly that FAQ that affected Reivers, as Reivers don't have fly. It came in a slightly later FAQ, specifically targeting Reivers.

I tend to give GW the benefit of the doubt on a lot of things, but this was a real head scratched for me!

It's all related, though. GW wanted to remove the ability to Deepstrike and have a charge of less than 9" for most troops. They actually did the same for Necron Wraiths and a couple of other "not quite Fly" rules, but forgot Reivers and GK Interceptors so had to go back and add the restrictions to them afterwards. So for a very brief moment GK actually had a squad that was more powerful than some of it's compatriots in other SM Codices. Very briefly.

Yeah, I get that. But it was still quite situational, and something you could deploy to prevent in most instances. If Reivers were alright anyway I wouldn't be bothered, but it really was the one decent thing about them as a unit compared to other options.

The other option is that reivers are supposed to be terrible so they could bring out veteran options later with relic knifes(like a power sword but not a power sword, GW style logic).

Though given how bad primaris units have been I just don't think GW understood what the core mechanic changes between 7th and 8th ment for the value of the models.

 Stux wrote:


Yeah, I get that. But it was still quite situational, and something you could deploy to prevent in most instances. If Reivers were alright anyway I wouldn't be bothered, but it really was the one decent thing about them as a unit compared to other options.

Agreed. It's definitely very strange that GW created all these bespoke, unique rules for essentially the same thing and then when they had a chance to use that uniqueness to differentiate two slightly different rules they simply applied the same blanket restriction to everything.

 argonak wrote:

kingheff wrote:

 Stux wrote:

kingheff wrote:
I played a unit of five with both the chutes and grapnel last night in a cities of death game. Coming in on turn three to root out a squad of havoc's perched on a ruin, nine inches away but only a three inch charge because of the grapnel.
Reivers are situational but nothing else in the marine arsenal can do what they do.

Grapnels don't work while charging these days, only in the movement phase. Got nerfed a little while back :(

It was like they're one cool little niche, stripped away...

Oh, didn't realise that. Was that in an FAQ?

It’s in space marine errata.

Thanks for the info, guess they can still be a slightly useful unit for objective grabbing but their cool trick has gone.

Ice_can wrote:
The other option is that reivers are supposed to be terrible so they could bring out veteran options later with relic knifes(like a power sword but not a power sword, GW style logic).

Though given how bad primaris units have been I just don't think GW understood what the core mechanic changes between 7th and 8th ment for the value of the models.

Well, that's essentially what I think they need. Give their knives like AP -2 and it would make them significantly more useful. Probably wouldn't even need a points bump in all honesty!