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I would like to know the legality of using a Detachment or Formation from ‘Dataslate: Officio Assassinorum’ in a Battle-forged army, legal for tournaments.

I haven’t been in the Warhammer 40k scene since GW first brought out the 5th edition, so I am a little rusty. I like the idea of my CSM army to have an allegiance with a corrupt khorne Eversor assassin, by adding him to my Allied Detachment . I have already written a cool story about how they got acquainted

Now This is what I understand about Battle-forged army rules:
-Two core detachments can be included in any Battle-forged: Combined Arms Detachment (CAD) and Allied Detachment.
- A faction’s CAD shows the minimum number of units of each battlefield role that must be included in that given detachment (1 HQ – 2 Troops), before optional units are added (e.g. Elites).
- Since the 6th edition, you are allowed to add to your FOC some units from a different faction, by placing them in a Detachment known as an ‘Allied Detachment’ (minimum 1 HQ – 1 Troops).

This is where I get confused

The Allied Detachment FOC states that the minimum number of units of each battlefield role that must be included in this detachment are 1 HQ and 1 Troops before other unit types are allowed ... but ALL assassins from the Officio Assassinorum Faction are considered ‘Elites’.

If I could add 1 HQ and 1 troops before I could have my Elite I would ... But the Officio Assassinorum Faction doesn’t have other units but Elites.

I have been reading online that you can just substitute your Allied Detachment for 1 assassin, or all 4 of them as a formation in a Battle forged army, but I am scared due to my bad English and slight confusion that I would not be able to explain my CSM having an assassin to a rules lawyer

I just would like to know what exactly parts/sentences/paragraphs/sections of the rule book I can quote to defend myself.


Thanks in advance guys

Firstly, welcome to Dakka!

In 7th, a Battle-Forged army may be made up of any number of Detatchments, in (almost) any combination. Some tournaments restrict you to only two Detachments.

The two 'default' Detachments are the Combined Arms and Allied, but other Detachments are available in Codexes and Campaign Books.

A Formation is a specific kind of Detachment, that forces you to either take exactly the units presented, or from a limited list of units.

Units may only belong to one Detachment.

So, rolling this all together:

You could take a Combined Arms Detachment (CAD) of Chaos Space Marines, and an Assassin Formation from the Assassinorum Dataslate in a legal Battle-Forged army, the Assassin would not take up any slots in the CAD, and would not gain any Command Benefits from the CAD.

Remember that you would still need to apply the rules for Allies, found on page 126-127 of the rulebook - particularly the One Eye Open rule, and the deployment restriction of Come The Apocalypse.

This image may help you understand how detachments work. Just ignore the bottom section, which is for the Bay Area Open tournament's rules.



Dataslate: Officio Assassinorum gives you the rules for an Officio Assassinorum Detachment, which consists of a single Elites choice. This means you can take an Officio Assassinorum Detachment with a single assassin, or you may even take multiple Officio Assassinorum Detachments to take more than one assassin in your army.

As for rules and page numbers:

Pg. 120 under 'Selecting Detachments' states:

"You can include any number and type of Detachments in a Battle-forged army provided you have sufficient units. Simply select a type of Detachment and organise some or all of your units so that they fit within the restrictions and limitations detailed on that particular Detachment."

Thanks for the fast response

First of all, thanks for the welcome to Dakka. I have read some very interesting topics so far from this forum and hope in time to be able to build enough experience to be able to help others

Remember that you would still need to apply the rules for Allies, found on page 126-127 of the Rulebook - particularly the One Eye Open rule, and the deployment restriction of Come The Apocalypse.

This will work great with the theme of a khorne Eversor assassin barely keeping himself from killing everything around him!

You could take a Combined Arms Detachment (CAD) of Chaos Space Marines, and an Assassin Formation from the Assassinorum Dataslate in a legal Battle-Forged army, the Assassin would not take up any slots in the CAD, and would not gain any Command Benefits from the CAD.

Does this mean that my 'Allied Detachment' slot has not being used up, as the Assassin Formation is a 'Faction Specific Detachment' and not a Allied Detachment?

Need_More_Dakka wrote:
Does this mean that my 'Allied Detachment' slot has not being used up, as the Assassin Formation is a 'Faction Specific Detachment' and not a Allied Detachment?

You don't have an Allied Detachment "slot" - the standard rules just give you examples of two detachments that are available to every army. You could take an Allied Detachment each of Tyranids, Eldar and Tau alongside your Chaos Space Marines Combined Arms Detachment and Officio Assassinorum Deetachment.

You could take an Allied Detachment each of Tyranids, Eldar and Tau alongside your Chaos Space Marines Combined Arms Detachment and Officio Assassinorum Deetachment

I get it! I finally get it! Cheers for that!

As an example, I can have 1 CAD, 3 Allied Detachments, and 2 Formations


One part I am still confused about all of the units in your army must belong to a Detachment and no unit can belong to more than one Detachment (Pg 118 Warhammer 40K Mini Rule Book)
So if I have enough units for a Formation in my CAD, they can't belong in both my CAD AND Formation?

Need_More_Dakka wrote:
I get it! I finally get it! Cheers for that!

As an example, I can have 1 CAD, 3 Allied Detachments, and 2 Formations (1 formation created due to having enough units in my CAD and one other formation from a faction not included in my CAD nor Allied Detachment?

You're almost there

Units cannot (unless otherwise stated, and it will say so in the codex/formation entry) belong to more than one detachment. So you cannot use units in your CAD to also fill slots in another formation. Also remember that formations are a special type of detachment, so you can make your army entirely up of formations, a formation and an Allied Detachment or any other combination.

Units cannot (unless otherwise stated, and it will say so in the codex/formation entry) belong to more than one detachment. So you cannot use units in your CAD to also fill slots in another formation. Also remember that formations are a special type of detachment, so you can make your army entirely up of formations, a formation and an Allied Detachment or any other combination

Basically I can have a Battle forged army of JUST 3 different formations from 3 different factions ... HOLY

Cheers for your help mate!

Thanks for helping me not accidentally cheat

Wouldn't be cheating, unbound is a totally legal way to field an army. It just so happens that most people online don't like to play against it.