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I recently picked up some new Space Elves for my morally ambiguous Eldar/Dark Eldar/Outcasts army. I mostly paint and rarely get a chance to actually get a game in. I actually haven't played one game of 7th yet. I've been feeling the itch more to play than paint lately, but I just haven't yet justified dropping the coin for rules and a codex. What to do!

I thought about using the 6th edition KT rules and just stick with small games, since I don't own tanks anymore (just boatloads of infantry). This way I could just buy the Eldar or DE codex for the story and profiles and stick to casual games. I also thought about dusting off my 3rd or 4th edition books and seeing if people want to "play retro" a bit, but I think my group is fully entrenched in the new edition.


Short version: would you recommend investing in the rules and codices for fluffy casual painter/collector types (Especially one who would rather stick to small points with infantry and not buy tanks, flyers and gargantuan creatures)?

If you want to play, and your group is playing 7th, you could hunt down the soft-cover version of the 7th main rulebook (available in the starter sets) on ebay. The main 3 book bundle is kind of a waste if you ask me. 1 book is fluff, 1 is pictures of models, and 1 is the actual rules.

If you want to play, I would recommend having the main rulebook and the applicable codex. This might hurt your wallet, because you'd need both the Eldar and Dark Eldar codex based on your post.

I think you mean soft-cover, lol. Soft-copy would be electronically stored. Its the old fashioned term for ebook.

Right you are, and duly edited.

Yeah, I think I would just pick a codex and stick with that. My elves are very clearly morally ambiguous enough that I could run them as either.

So that's like $70 or so? I could do that, I suppose.

Wait, isn't he specifying that he's a fluffy player? We are suggesting for him to skip buying the fluff? I'm confused......

 ProwlerPC wrote:
Wait, isn't he specifying that he's a fluffy player? We are suggesting for him to skip buying the fluff? I'm confused......

Codices barely have fluff anymore. You're almost always going to be better off buying a cheap used copy of an older version of the codex if you don't care about the rules.

 melkorthetonedeaf wrote:
I also thought about dusting off my 3rd or 4th edition books and seeing if people want to "play retro" a bit, but I think my group is fully entrenched in the new edition.

I recently came back to the Hobby and honestly, I am utterly disappointed by the constantly decrease in Codexes material and for this reason, I will tell you to not buy them.

I don't really know about other codexes but AM, Eldar and DE are mostly rehashes of 6th Ed with less fluff andpretty much the same pictures and artworks. I'm playing IG, and our current book is just an insult to the diversity of what should be the Guard; the White Dwarf Syndrom in this is way too high...

I had strictly zero moral issue getting mine by heretic ways and I would recommand you to do so, especially if you're not playing in tournaments. And I have to say that I'm quite amazed by most forumers' resignation about this; I feel like everyone in there is buying Codexes with their eyes shut, like it is some kind of curse or something. You can actually avoid to be walled-fethed for such low quality stuff (still talking about Codexes I know).

38€ for a dull Cadian showcase, reduced creativity and poor fluff material is just not my cup of tea, especially when it can be invalidated anytime by a new edition... that you will have to buy again!! Thanks GW!

 RazgrizOne wrote:
I recently came back to the Hobby and honestly, I am utterly disappointed by the constantly decrease in Codexes material and for this reason, I will tell you to not buy them.

I don't really know about other codexes but AM, Eldar and DE are mostly rehashes of 6th Ed with less fluff andpretty much the same pictures and artworks. I'm playing IG, and our current book is just an insult to the diversity of what should be the Guard; the White Dwarf Syndrom in this is way too high...

I had strictly zero moral issue getting mine by heretic ways and I would recommand you to do so, especially if you're not playing in tournaments. And I have to say that I'm quite amazed by most forumers' resignation about this; I feel like everyone in there is buying Codexes with their eyes shut, like it is some kind of curse or something. You can actually avoid to be walled-fethed for such low quality stuff (still talking about Codexes I know).

38€ for a dull Cadian showcase, reduced creativity and poor fluff material is just not my cup of tea, especially when it can be invalidated anytime by a new edition... that you will have to buy again!! Thanks GW!

You gotta freeze the rules for your army and move on at some point to escape their increasingly frequent churn of updates. I suppose this is hard to do if you play strangers alot, but your friends will surely understand. But man, how could anyone keep up. I didn't pay attention for like 2 weeks, and I think 2 40k codices came out (as well as an Assasins board game)

I know what you mean about decrease in content. Older codices are just packed with information. Forgeworld books are still good this way.

@jasper76

Yes, obviously, I only play with friends because I don't see myself walking on the GW store and bring my paper-copied version ahah. I don't like GW but, there's a limit which is correctness.

Forgeworld books are still good this way.

I can only agree with this. IA books are awesome and everytime I read them, I feel propulsed to the 41st Millenium. But I did not really bought them either, which make me feel slightly more concerned. FW guys are doing great job, despite their crazy price tags.

Short version: would you recommend investing in the rules and codices for fluffy casual painter/collector types (Especially one who would rather stick to small points with infantry and not buy tanks, flyers and gargantuan creatures)?

Indeed I would. I'm actually playing Sunblitz Brotherhood and using the IA11 Corsair rules with DE and Eldar allies. They're so much fun to paint and organize into fluffy armies now. The corsair army is still competitive and the new rules for Eldar Missile Launchers (you get surface to air missiles for free with purchase) means you don't need flyers to have protection in the skies. Our tanks aren't amazing anymore and the Wraithknight isn't very fun to play with or against, so you can put together competitive, fluffy, fun armies without the need for any of these things. Would definitely suggest picking up the codexes and playing around with formations. There's so much variety that works these days.

Unless you play Necrons, Eldar, or Mechanicus I would find alternative sources for faction-rules until a new book comes out. For all we know an update is only months away. Source a soft-cover rulebook from ebay and get your fluff fix from one of the various online 40k encyclopedias.

 RazgrizOne wrote:

Forgeworld books are still good this way.

I can only agree with this. IA books are awesome and everytime I read them, I feel propulsed to the 41st Millenium. But I did not really bought them either, which make me feel slightly more concerned. FW guys are doing great job, despite their crazy price tags.

Much as I completely agree with you, I fear Imperial Armour has practically been abandoned in the wake of Horus Heresy's success. No truly new books in over two years and dozens of models have been discontinued to make room for more marines. It's a good thing some of the Traitor legions have compelling pre-heresy fluff because I find most of the loyalists dull and like FW goodies too much to consider not playing space marines.

Much as I completely agree with you, I fear Imperial Armour has practically been abandoned in the wake of Horus Heresy's success. No truly new books in over two years and dozens of models have been discontinued to make room for more marines. It's a good thing some of the Traitor legions have compelling pre-heresy fluff because I find most of the loyalists dull and like FW goodies too much to consider not playing space marines.

I'm confident in the future of the IA series. One day, the HH would get out of breath, I mean, you can't produce Primarchs for eternity and not everyone is a fond of marine stuff. The HH events are finite and there are good chances that FW get back to 40k when the novel serie will be over. Plus there is plenty of new stuff to use in potential IA books, like Admech and new space marines chapters.

If you are smart, you can get pdf versions of codices for free.

You mean, if you're a criminal, you can get pdf versions of codices for free.

I fail to feel guilty for a company which charge almost the same for its hardbacks and ebooks.

 jasper76 wrote:

 melkorthetonedeaf wrote:
I also thought about dusting off my 3rd or 4th edition books and seeing if people want to "play retro" a bit, but I think my group is fully entrenched in the new edition.

I'm still not 100% sold on buying stuff, so I think I'll stick to this.

 RazgrizOne wrote:
I fail to feel guilty for a company which charge almost the same for its hardbacks and ebooks.

The law cares not for your feelings of guilt.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
You mean, if you're a criminal, you can get pdf versions of codices for free.

If someone leaves a codex untouched for more then 2 min, it is free game for anyone to pick it up. nothing criminal about it.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
You mean, if you're a criminal, you can get pdf versions of codices for free.

There are places on earth where copyright infringement is a civil, rather than criminal offense, and other places where it's no type of offense at all. Criminal is one of those irregular nouns, remember that. He's a criminal, she's a tortious offender, and I'm smart.

Makumba wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:
You mean, if you're a criminal, you can get pdf versions of codices for free.

If someone leaves a codex untouched for more then 2 min, it is free game for anyone to pick it up. nothing criminal about it.

What? This guy must be trolling. You'd take someones codex?

 RazgrizOne wrote:
I recently came back to the Hobby and honestly, I am utterly disappointed by the constantly decrease in Codexes material and for this reason, I will tell you to not buy them.

I don't really know about other codexes but AM, Eldar and DE are mostly rehashes of 6th Ed with less fluff andpretty much the same pictures and artworks. I'm playing IG, and our current book is just an insult to the diversity of what should be the Guard; the White Dwarf Syndrom in this is way too high...

I had strictly zero moral issue getting mine by heretic ways and I would recommand you to do so, especially if you're not playing in tournaments. And I have to say that I'm quite amazed by most forumers' resignation about this; I feel like everyone in there is buying Codexes with their eyes shut, like it is some kind of curse or something. You can actually avoid to be walled-fethed for such low quality stuff (still talking about Codexes I know).

38€ for a dull Cadian showcase, reduced creativity and poor fluff material is just not my cup of tea, especially when it can be invalidated anytime by a new edition... that you will have to buy again!! Thanks GW!

This.

Once you buy the codex, you'll be disgusted at how much you paid for how little effort or care on GW's part.

I mean they took out all the cool art of the units and replaced it with photographs of models. They stripped out the 1/2 - 3/4 page unit fluff and replaced it with a paragraph. And thats not even mentioning the balance - halfassed would be a huge overstatement. feth em I say

Thanks for tue honest review!

@Furyou Miko

The law cares not for your feelings of guilt.

The number of feths I give about your remark is equal to the probability of getting a fine by French government because of what I did.