Genestealer Cult news & rumours - FAQ / Designer Commentary page 45

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**lord_blackfang**

zamerion wrote:
Each character is 20 euros

jackal alphus 30
Atalan jackals 42

Sector mechanicus tectonic fragdrill 45

Decent price on the Jackals, as expected on terrain, pretty harsh on the characters.

**tneva82**

Characters are pretty standard for GW characters so if anything good they didn't do another price hike there.

**YeOldSaltPotato**

Timeshadow wrote:
My personal speculation is that you will have to mark where your "ambush points" are with the markers during deployment and the roll allows you to deploy further away/closer to enemy units plus the bouneses of shoot and or move on higher rolls. The only big thing is will it be 1d6 or a 2d6 table and will there be (if it's 1d6) 7+results?

Seeing a +3 bonus on a character has me assuming it's at least a 2d6. +3 is pretty absurd on 1d6.

**H.B.M.C.**

So looking at AUD$40 for the characters, which is pretty harsh for human-sized characters (harsh for Marine-sized characters, but whatever).

AUD$98 for the drill, which is the same as the impossible to find Ferratonic Incinerator.

And AUD$55 for the sniper on the bike, and around $90 for the bikers, both of which is frickin' insane!

**tneva82**

The 20e is around standard for infantry PLASTIC characters from GW these days. Remember these are plastic which means which characters extra price tag. Thank GW and their fixation on plastic characters.

**H.B.M.C.**

I don't care if it's the standard price they put on them. It's still ridiculous.

**SnotlingPimpWagon**

The sky is blue
The grass is green
HMBC, it’s your queue
About the price to scream

Seriously, dude, it’s like you’re surprised every time

So, the quad bike is in the same kit as regular bikes?
I’m definitely getting that Locus...
Will I be able to field any of those guys (characters, bikes) in killteam?

**Kharne the Befriender**

zamerion wrote:
Each character is 20 euros

jackal alphus 30
Atalan jackals 42

Sector mechanicus tectonic fragdrill 45

EDIT: Nvm got it figured out,

25$ for the Characters, 35$ for the Alphus, 50$ for the Jackals, and 55$(?) for the Drill.

Does that seem about right?

**terry**

Haighus wrote:
Kirasu wrote:
Genestealer Cult may be the first army with a codex to have more characters than non-character units.

Hmm, that may have been Harlequins *goes off to count*

Edit: count done. 3 characters to 4 units (although only three kits). So yup, GSC likely to be the first.

Harlequins have 4 characters: Troup master, shadowseer, death jester and the solitair. So they've got the same out of characters as none characters

**Kanluwen**

Kharne the Befriender wrote:
zamerion wrote:
Each character is 20 euros

jackal alphus 30
Atalan jackals 42

Sector mechanicus tectonic fragdrill 45

EDIT: Nvm got it figured out,

25$ for the Characters, 35$ for the Alphus, 50$ for the Jackals, and 55$(?) for the Drill.

Does that seem about right?

Basically.

**Haighus**

terry wrote:
Haighus wrote:
Kirasu wrote:
Genestealer Cult may be the first army with a codex to have more characters than non-character units.

Hmm, that may have been Harlequins *goes off to count*

Edit: count done. 3 characters to 4 units (although only three kits). So yup, GSC likely to be the first.

Harlequins have 4 characters: Troup master, shadowseer, death jester and the solitair. So they've got the same out of characters as none characters

Ah, forgot the Troupe master was no longer a sergeant basically.

**The Phazer**

SnotlingPimpWagon wrote:
The sky is blue
The grass is green
HMBC, it’s your queue
About the price to scream

Seriously, dude, it’s like you’re surprised every time

So, the quad bike is in the same kit as regular bikes?
I’m definitely getting that Locus...
Will I be able to field any of those guys (characters, bikes) in killteam?

I think it's very unlikely the bikes will be made available in Kill Team (unless there's another expansion that covers slightly larger models, like the ever present Thunderwolf Cavalry mystery), but I cold see White Dwarf getting Commander rules for some of the characters.

**Red Corsair**

Those GSC dice from last time were terrible anyway. So hard to read. The GW dice are neat, but mostly garbage. I think their best set bar none are their store founding dice.

Which are obviously a PITA to acquire.

Has anyone seen first hand how those squig dice roll? They bounce all over lol.

**Prometheum5**

Red Corsair wrote:

Has anyone seen first hand how those squig dice roll? They bounce all over lol.

The Squig dice are a glorious mess. Super worth it as a box of desk toys/ fidget toys. Absolute trash as a gaming tool.

In other news, novelty symbol dice are still bad, regardless of where the symbol is.

**Galas**

I'm very happy with my dark angel and Adeptus Custodes dice.

But the squig ones like the nurgle ones was obvious they were very bad as proper dice.

**Kdash**

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2019/01/28/genestealer-cults-rules-preview-part-1/

New article!

Cult Ambush
This ability is at the very heart of everything it means to field the Genestealer Cults in battle. It represents the culmination of all the cult’s cunning machinations and careful planning that has led them to this battlefield. Cult Ambush gives you all the tools you need to start every battle on the front foot** – if you can maintain the momentum, victory will surely be yours.

The ability takes two forms according to how you choose to set up your units, so let’s take a quick look at each.
Setting Up Underground: During deployment, you can set up Infantry and Bike units with the Cult Ambush ability underground. At the end of any of your Movement phases, some or all of these units can emerge anywhere on the battlefield that is more than 9″ from enemy models. The freedom you’ll have to suddenly strike your opponent’s forces in great force from any direction will cause mayhem with their battleplans.

Setting Up in Ambush: Were you wondering what those 28 ‘blip’ counters that come with the codex were for? They are, in fact, Cult Ambush markers designed to help you play horrible mind games with your opponent as you set up!
https://whc-cdn.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/40kGSCArmyRules-Jan28-Blips20tcvdg.jpg" border="0" />

Instead of setting up a unit underground or on the battlefield, you can choose to place an ambush marker anywhere within your deployment zone. You can place a marker for each unit you choose to set up an ambush – even Transports and larger Vehicles such as a Cult Leman Russcan be set up in this manner! The crucial detail here is that you don’t need to assign which units are represented by each ambush marker – you can decide that later. There is also a sneaky Stratagem that enables you to place additional ambush markers to further confound your opponent.

If you have the first turn, you reveal all of your ambush markers at the start of your first Movement phase. If your opponent goes first, you instead reveal all of your ambush markers at the end of their first Movement phase, and they cannot move anywhere within 9″ of any ambush markers beforehand.
These markers are revealed one at a time – each time you do so, you select one unit from your army that you set up in ambush, then set up one model from that unit within 1″ of that ambush marker, followed by any other models in the unit. All units set up in this manner must be wholly within your deployment zone – that is, unless you further mess with your opponent by changing the nature of your ambush.

**Cephalobeard**

This seems... very weak compared to the current table, outside of the ability to functionally null-deploy.

**the_scotsman**

Cephalobeard wrote:
This seems... very weak compared to the current table, outside of the ability to functionally null-deploy.

I actually kind of love it. Ambush markers essentially act as a built-in light infantry screen (since you effectively present your opponent a deep strike distance restriction in their first movement phase) and they give you a bit of flexibility as you can chain your own units out from the marker when you reveal them on your turn before moving.

it's certainly weaker in terms of flat out alpha strike charges, but if you want GSC to be anything other than "the army that just does that and only that and all their other options are kept underpowered because otherwise they'd be super busted" then you need to give some of that up.

I'd much much much rather have neophytes, goliaths, bikers, etc allowed to be usable in exchange for not being able to forcefeed my opponent 60 genestealers in close combat turn 1.

**Cephalobeard**

Well, the side effect of this may very well end up being "The most viable option is just hordes of neophytes because melee ambush is now unreliable and unlikely" and I don't know if that playstyle is what people subscribed to, but we'll see.

**Hulksmash**

Full null-deploy is pretty insane. If it doesn't have a cap on it then you can eliminate and entire turn from your opponent which is huge. Gonna need to see the details but this feels insanely strong.

**Sunny Side Up**

Seems like a lot of admin to what could've essentially been "Genestealer Cult armies always set up second, irrespective of the die roll" and a potential strat similar to Phantasm, etc..

It's situationally powerful against some stuff like enemy Kraken Stealers or Ynnari Spears, that have to stay away 9" first turn. But most games, it seems, it'll just be "now I flip these things" at the start. The blips don't move or do anything really, as far as I read it.

It's a weird flip as it makes GSC pretty descent at denying opponents with strong 1st turn assaults their thing, while doing essentially nothing against those Guard, Tau, Guilliman, etc.. castles that GSC used to be a descent answer to.

**Carnikang**

the_scotsman wrote:
Cephalobeard wrote:
This seems... very weak compared to the current table, outside of the ability to functionally null-deploy.

I actually kind of love it. Ambush markers essentially act as a built-in light infantry screen (since you effectively present your opponent a deep strike distance restriction in their first movement phase) and they give you a bit of flexibility as you can chain your own units out from the marker when you reveal them on your turn before moving.

it's certainly weaker in terms of flat out alpha strike charges, but if you want GSC to be anything other than "the army that just does that and only that and all their other options are kept underpowered because otherwise they'd be super busted" then you need to give some of that up.

I'd much much much rather have neophytes, goliaths, bikers, etc allowed to be usable in exchange for not being able to forcefeed my opponent 60 genestealers in close combat turn 1.

No one is deepstriking in the first movement phase, barring BA. You reveal your tokens at the end of their first movement, meaning things like, Da Jump and other psychic powers are still going to get their unit 9" away.

I'm hoping we still have a table to roll on, considering the Kellermorph adds to a roll...

**the_scotsman**

Cephalobeard wrote:
Well, the side effect of this may very well end up being "The most viable option is just hordes of neophytes because melee ambush is now unreliable and unlikely" and I don't know if that playstyle is what people subscribed to, but we'll see.

It might. I'm betting it won't though - if you don't think that there is very likely to be a warlord trait, Character trait(s) on the Primus, new planner guy, maybe a psychic power letting you bring a unit in and getting it to charge beyond that 3CP strat, then I'm going to say you are maybe a little pessimistic.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Carnikang wrote:
the_scotsman wrote:
Cephalobeard wrote:
This seems... very weak compared to the current table, outside of the ability to functionally null-deploy.

I actually kind of love it. Ambush markers essentially act as a built-in light infantry screen (since you effectively present your opponent a deep strike distance restriction in their first movement phase) and they give you a bit of flexibility as you can chain your own units out from the marker when you reveal them on your turn before moving.

it's certainly weaker in terms of flat out alpha strike charges, but if you want GSC to be anything other than "the army that just does that and only that and all their other options are kept underpowered because otherwise they'd be super busted" then you need to give some of that up.

I'd much much much rather have neophytes, goliaths, bikers, etc allowed to be usable in exchange for not being able to forcefeed my opponent 60 genestealers in close combat turn 1.

No one is deepstriking in the first movement phase, barring BA. You reveal your tokens at the end of their first movement, meaning things like, Da Jump and other psychic powers are still going to get their unit 9" away.

I'm hoping we still have a table to roll on, considering the Kellermorph adds to a roll...

Right. Your tokens limit things like super fast moving slaanesh daemons and the like getting right up in your face because your opponent can't move closer than 9" to them, and you set up within 1" of them (meaning effectively you apply the "over 9"" deep strike restriction to your opponents in your first phase).

Because we know you can have fake-out blips, you can limit them even farther than that, by dropping your tokens in a line on your deployment zone. of course as you say, BA GK and orks can get around this, but nobody else can.

**Carnikang**

Entirely true.
It's not bad, and I do like it, I would just like for it to not entirely replace the current way of Ambush. It will have a good number of uses.

That other strat that allows you to take up to 3 units that are blipped and put them underground, the wording on that means you can have more than half your army underground right? That also adds up to three more decoy blips...

I may be reading that wrong.

**Red Corsair**

Hulksmash wrote:
Full null-deploy is pretty insane. If it doesn't have a cap on it then you can eliminate and entire turn from your opponent which is huge. Gonna need to see the details but this feels insanely strong.

It doesn't work that way. You reveal them before your opponents shooting phase so they still can shoot at anything that was blipped. The strength however, is that you can choose to deploy all your tanks away from their AT and all your infantry away from their AI.

Not sure how folks are thinking Da Jump or grey knights get around it either, sure they teleport in the psychic phase, but they still end up over 9" away. The only things that really hard counter it that I can tell are soul burst, quicken and warp time and hive commander.

It seems really fun and very simple which I like.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sunny Side Up wrote:
Seems like a lot of admin to what could've essentially been "Genestealer Cult armies always set up second, irrespective of the die roll" and a potential strat similar to Phantasm, etc..

It's situationally powerful against some stuff like enemy Kraken Stealers or Ynnari Spears, that have to stay away 9" first turn. But most games, it seems, it'll just be "now I flip these things" at the start. The blips don't move or do anything really, as far as I read it.

It's a weird flip as it makes GSC pretty descent at denying opponents with strong 1st turn assaults their thing, while doing essentially nothing against those Guard, Tau, Guilliman, etc.. castles that GSC used to be a descent answer to.

That isn't the same though. If I set up second and I seize I won't benefit like I will with this system. Further more, using this system I reveal my ambush tokens AFTER my opponents first movement phase, which is leagues more powerful.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Cephalobeard wrote:
This seems... very weak compared to the current table, outside of the ability to functionally null-deploy.

I disagree, this is so much stronger. Before you could only reliably get one unit a turn in, staring turn 2. Meanwhile all your support units suffered. Having a magus or neophyte blob roll a 1 was a disaster before when aiming for a power to go off or an objective grab.

**Sunny Side Up**

Red Corsair wrote:

Not sure how folks are thinking Da Jump or grey knights get around it either, sure they teleport in the psychic phase, but they still end up over 9" away. The only things that really hard counter it that I can tell are soul burst, quicken and warp time and hive commander.

It seems really fun and very simple which I like.

Sure. Da Jump (also Hive Commander), etc.. happen after the GSC revealed all their units. Thus they are not any worse off than they would be against any other opponent. Only 1st turn movement "re-deploy" is really affected, which is mostly DMC, the Blood Angels re-deploy and perhaps Tide of Traitors/Green Tide/Black Cornucopia, should you opt to use these 1st turn on a healthy unit just to re-deploy.

**Red Corsair**

Cephalobeard wrote:
Well, the side effect of this may very well end up being "The most viable option is just hordes of neophytes because melee ambush is now unreliable and unlikely" and I don't know if that playstyle is what people subscribed to, but we'll see.

Better then the current meta of relying on kraken stealers and neuropthropes to actually do what the GSC should be doing. Your stuck thinking the army revolves around abberants because thats all that was decent prior, which is fair because you hadn't played the army in 7th unless i am mistaken. Acolytes and metamorphs will go down for sure and your going to be ambushing 5 times what you were from the index. The army was busted in 7th because it had too easy a time getting cheap acolytes 1" away that hit like a ton of bricks. Plus, I am sure the primus and nexos do something clever, plus their are doctrines and strats. I am not worried in the slightest. I am happier they cleaned up the random system from before.

**Cephalobeard**

I agree this is much, much more powerful defensively, but GSC don't "feel" like a defensive army.

As others have noted, it obviously helps them turn 1 with some clever positioning and a bit of defense, and we'll see if there is still an "Ambush Table" (based only off of the Kellermorph wording) or not, but I feel we don't have the full picture just yet.

Im hopeful, I'm just not jumping out of my chair, which is likely the best result for balance's sake.

**Red Corsair**

Sunny Side Up wrote:
Red Corsair wrote:

Not sure how folks are thinking Da Jump or grey knights get around it either, sure they teleport in the psychic phase, but they still end up over 9" away. The only things that really hard counter it that I can tell are soul burst, quicken and warp time and hive commander.

It seems really fun and very simple which I like.

Sure. Da Jump (also Hive Commander), etc.. happen after the GSC revealed all their units. Thus they are not any worse off than they would be against any other opponent. Only 1st turn movement "re-deploy" is really affected, which is mostly DMC, the Blood Angels re-deploy and perhaps Tide of Traitors/Green Tide/Black Cornucopia, should you opt to use these 1st turn on a healthy unit just to re-deploy.

No they aren't, those units would still need to remain over 9" away. Not really seeing your point, maybe we are talking past one another though.

**Sunny Side Up**

Red Corsair wrote:

No they aren't, those units would still need to remain over 9" away. Not really seeing your point, maybe we are talking past one another though.

They would. But they also would need to remain over 9" away against a Tau army. The blips don't change anything. There is no advantage or disadvantage. By the time they cast the spell, they would know which GSC unit is where, the blips would've been flipped already, and get to 9" of the intended target. If they want to get within 9 of, say, the Leman Russ, that Leman Russ is already on the board in the psychic phase.No deception going on anymore. The "this blip was nothing"-trick wouldn't work, because you have to do it before the psychic phase even starts.

A Kraken Genestealer unit or Ynnari Spear or even a Land Strider Gallant on a good deployment unit could easily get into 9" of an enemy in their movement phase, but cannot against the Genestealer blips. And even if the blips are no longer there on the potential second movement through Hive Commander/Quicken/Etc.. the GSC player can reveal his units as to make the first movement of those units matter as little as possible. So there is value to the GSC against those. Maybe they moved within 9" of a blip, only to have it be a decoy.

Funny enough, it also blocks flyers pretty hard. All those "fly-over-a-unit-and-drop-some-MW-stuff" from Voidravens, etc.. are basically off against GSC on the first turn.