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Hey guys.

Since im new to warhammer 40k tabletop (started 2 months ago) i havent witnessed an edition change before.

I was wondering, how long is the wait generally, from the edition is officially out, till new codexes for Xenos start coming out? And after that, how many models does each Xenos race usually get in each edition?

For instance, i play orks and i have no idea which units were added in 8th. So im just trying to piece together all the new information, which so far, i believe most can agree on the fact that Orks have been monumentally shat on in this edition so far (and yes i know its quite a statement and things can change, but SO FAR it doesnt look good). At least if you run mainly melee armies as a horde. including the lack of specialist detatchments which actually made the faction fun and interesting.

So how long would i have to wait to see some new changes to the orks and their codexes? and how long and how many models would i be able to expect to arrive to the 9th edition scene for the orks? I hope they add specialist detatchments to the core codex and make it a base thing.

Sadly GW is really inconsistent about that. To the best of my knowledge they haven't released a new Tryanid kit since 2014. Orks were still using their 4th ed codex in 6th ed.* The Dark Eldar had a good long stretch too. Even some parts of the Marine line are really old, the current Biker kit is on it's second decade. That's not without a silver lining, if you're not playing a loyalist or chaos marine army the cost to keep your collection up to date is a lot lower, but that's hardly comforting when there's a new Primaris release seemingly every other week.

The point is, GW getting codexes out for every army during 8th edition was actually something of a novelty. They've said they're planning to update all the codexes again in 9th iirc, but there's no guarantee it that won't mean just consolidating the current codex, Munitorum points changes, and the new rules in the Psychic Awakening series into a single book.

* Someone is sure to correct me on the exact details.

Edition change, first codex, Aeldari codexes, last codex. In previous editions some factions have gone without a codex update for several editions, 8th was a change to form and massively increased release rates, although most of the datasheets and stuff was already finished through the Indexes.

Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition Rulebook Released June 2017

Codex: Space Marines Released July 2017

Codex: Craftworlds Released October 2017

Codex: Dark Eldar Released March 2018

Codex: Harlequins Released May 2018

Codex: Adepta Sororitas Released November 2019

Beardedragon wrote:
Hey guys.

Since im new to warhammer 40k tabletop (started 2 months ago) i havent witnessed an edition change before.

I was wondering, how long is the wait generally, from the edition is officially out, till new codexes for Xenos start coming out? And after that, how many models does each Xenos race usually get in each edition?

For instance, i play orks and i have no idea which units were added in 8th. So im just trying to piece together all the new information, which so far, i believe most can agree on the fact that Orks have been monumentally shat on in this edition so far (and yes i know its quite a statement and things can change, but SO FAR it doesnt look good). At least if you run mainly melee armies as a horde. including the lack of specialist detatchments which actually made the faction fun and interesting.

So how long would i have to wait to see some new changes to the orks and their codexes? and how long and how many models would i be able to expect to arrive to the 9th edition scene for the orks? I hope they add specialist detatchments to the core codex and make it a base thing.

There is no way to answer this. When 8th launched, Codex Marines and Codex Deathguard all came out within a month from base rules release. Likely this time the same will be the case, except it will be Marines and Necrons first. Orks could get the Necron treatment, with half or more of the army getting totally redone come October, or they could limp along with no model releases or codex releases until December of 2021.

Given what we know about this game so far, GW seems to be working in a long term (5-10 year road-map) to remove all metal/finecast models, and to update ranges with models that are 20+ years old or older. Following that logic, Eldar, Orcs, Tyranids, and Guard all are due for the same treatment that the Necrons are getting right now. Furthermore, if you look in the rumor engine pictures that GW places out for the public each week, you'll see a lot of stuff that looks to be eldar related, alongside Ad Mech. I would expect Ad Mech to get a codex early this edition with all the new models they got from engine war. As always, it's going to be about patience. However, also note that there are likely to be surprises in there mixed in. For example, there have been a lot of lore mentions to the return of the squats lately. It's also been suggested that the Old Ones may return to do battle against the Necrons and their hated enemies the C'Tan. Traitor Guard and Dark Mechanicus are almost certainly going to be a thing (when, none can say, but it's a safe bet that they'll be armies in and of themselves at some point) and that means that older line updates could be held back or up. Also, Covid can at anytime send us all running back into lockdown, which will harm and already covid harmed design and release schedule.

Also, I'd caution you about getting too upset when it comes to the stuff you read/hear online. Theory-hammer rarely ever matters in the grand schema of things. Also, in one of the lead up to 9th livestreams, GW did say all 9th ed codexes were tested together. Which likely means they're all done and just waiting to be printed and sold.

Beardedragon wrote:
...And after that, how many models does each Xenos race usually get in each edition?...

In my experience xenos armies tend to get one massive overhaul and then nothing for ten years (Dark Eldar, Necrons), or get maybe a kit or two an edition (Orks, Craftworlders, Tau, Tyranids). GSC and Harlequins are too new to have much of a pattern but they did get big initial release waves, so they're probably getting no new models until about 2028.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Togusa wrote:
...Also, I'd caution you about getting too upset when it comes to the stuff you read/hear online. Theory-hammer rarely ever matters in the grand schema of things.

Mind also that a lot of us are either complaining about our local meta/playgroup (which may not resemble yours) or griping to hear ourselves gripe.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

The Newman wrote:
...* Someone is sure to correct me on the exact details.

If you insist. There was a Broodlord in 2016.

Well, the Necron Codex is virtually guaranteed to be among the first two Codexes to be released.

Along with Marines, they are in the starter box, so those two are the books that will hit the shelves within a month or so of the box.

All the others, Xenos and non-Xenos, is anyone's guess. I see no reason why Orks would be particularly high on their to-do-list compared to others (Chaos Daemons and AdMech seem like books they might wanna do, just because those have lots of new models not in their current book, but that's just speculation).

Years if ever.

Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

Rumours have it that Orks will be one of the first codices to be updated. Apparently, it's already finished.
My guess is that it will be released within the next 3 months.

My understanding is that all the codexes are being written/have been written and tested at the same time, so in theory the timing would be determined by production not design time.

Orks and Necrons should be two of the soonest to be released. Expect beautiful new ork boyz.

Beardedragon wrote:
For instance, i play orks and i have no idea which units were added in 8th.

In 8th we got all the buggies, Da Red Gobbo, Thrakka and Makari.

So im just trying to piece together all the new information, which so far, i believe most can agree on the fact that Orks have been monumentally shat on in this edition so far (and yes i know its quite a statement and things can change, but SO FAR it doesnt look good). At least if you run mainly melee armies as a horde. including the lack of specialist detatchments which actually made the faction fun and interesting.

Orks are a combined arms army that heavily relies on shooting, in 8th melee was more of an utility tool than a way to actually kill models. There is plenty of stuff in our codex which got better or stayed the same, just not the things currently used in tournaments. Don't count them out yet.

So how long would i have to wait to see some new changes to the orks and their codexes? and how long and how many models would i be able to expect to arrive to the 9th edition scene for the orks? I hope they add specialist detatchments to the core codex and make it a base thing.

Orks get roughly one release per year, while they have no clue what to do with us rules-wise, at least we are inspiring the creative guys to keep coming up with new ork models. I expect the codex to appear within one year, though I might be wrong. The rumor has some merit to it, as it would explain the weird KFF mek datasheet in Saga of the Beast.

Predicting GWs releases is like the one situation where being a veteran or newbie makes no difference at all. Your guess is as good as ours.

 Jidmah wrote:

Beardedragon wrote:
For instance, i play orks and i have no idea which units were added in 8th.

In 8th we got all the buggies, Da Red Gobbo, Thrakka and Makari.

Also the Wartrike.

 harlokin wrote:
Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

To be perfectly honest, I'd probably welcome the Eldar books being fully merged at this point.

At least with Farseers, Autarchs, Shadowseers and Troupe Masters, Dark Eldar would finally have some worthwhile HQ choices.

 vipoid wrote:

 harlokin wrote:
Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

To be perfectly honest, I'd probably welcome the Eldar books being fully merged at this point.

At least with Farseers, Autarchs, Shadowseers and Troupe Masters, Dark Eldar would finally have some worthwhile HQ choices.

And would no longer be Dark Eldar.

GW selling one book instead of 3? Not gonna happen, unless the price's book is now 3x than a single codex.

To be honest I'd rather go back to 3rd-6th editions when codexes last 2 editions, so each faction got a new book every 6-7 years. Now it's 2 books per edition, which is insane IMHO.

 vipoid wrote:

 harlokin wrote:
Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

To be perfectly honest, I'd probably welcome the Eldar books being fully merged at this point.

At least with Farseers, Autarchs, Shadowseers and Troupe Masters, Dark Eldar would finally have some worthwhile HQ choices.

So the 2nd ed book?

 harlokin wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 harlokin wrote:
Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

To be perfectly honest, I'd probably welcome the Eldar books being fully merged at this point.

At least with Farseers, Autarchs, Shadowseers and Troupe Masters, Dark Eldar would finally have some worthwhile HQ choices.

And would no longer be Dark Eldar.

I mean, I feel I could just as easily make that claim with regard to the current codex and ruleset. Especially when the new points basically discourage us from using some of the most thematic elements of our army.

But more than that, what is the point of remaining 'pure' when everything that made Dark Eldar likable in the first place has been stripped out? Even combined, our HQs have all the fun and flavour of a Imperium accountant, and most have about the same level of combat aptitude. Archons are supposed to be wielding the greatest wargear available, which now amounts to a couple of crap pistols and some abysmal melee weapons. Haemonculi are similarly said to wield a variety of nightmarish devices, which amounts to a few ranged weapons (each competing to be worse than the others), and a selection of melee weapons with almost no variety beyond some of them being inexcusably terrible. Succubi are dedicated melee fighters, which leads to them having the fewest attacks and worst melee weapons (if you can believe that).

Then you've got stuff like Raiders and Ravagers trading armour for speed . . . yet both are actually slower than heavily-armoured Eldar tanks.

But at least they've kept their trademark ability to move and shoot without penalty, thus highlighting Dark Eldar's focus on speed and mobility above all else. Oh, wait, nevermind - that ability has been extended to every other vehicle in the game. Because why should Dark Eldar be able to do anything better than Marines?

Plus all the little things - even the ones that didn't get used much. For example, Hellions used to be able to take a weapon that let them kidnap enemy characters. When they fell back from combat, they could potentially take an enemy character with them. Even if it wasn't used much, I love that sort of thing because it's great flavour and it's the sort of thing that's fun to try. So what does that weapon do now? A Mortal Wound on a 6+ to wound. Wow, save some innovation for the other armies!

Put simply, at this point, trying to preserve Dark Eldar's flabour seems akin to trying to preserve the burnt-out ruins of a once-great house. Yes, the walls are still there, but it's nothing but a hollow shell.


To be clear, I don't *like* that this is the case. I would much rather see Dark Eldar properly fleshed out again, with new units to replace the swathes of units that have been cut from their codex in recent editions.

However, I'm also a pragmatist and at this point I'm resigned to the fact that no one at GW gives the slightest damn about Dark Eldar. Hence why swathes of our units have been cut and the only models we've gotten in the last decade have been remakes of existing ones (and about half of them have been worse sculpts than the models they replaced).

Hence, whilst it is far from my ideal solution, merging the Eldar books seems about the only thing I can expect from GW which might inject even a shred of life into the corpse of the army I once loved.

Thanks for all the replies.

How often are Forge world units added to the game then?

Also i hope they give some love for Goblin armies. They made a special detatchment that could work for fun armies, but then they removed it again from tournements for 9th which is just super sad..

I just got my hands on 4 grot tanks :(((

i always wanted to do a detatchment with Goblins

 vipoid wrote:

 harlokin wrote:
Just thinking about it depresses me. At this point I'd probably be grateful if I was sure that there was going to be another Drukhari codex, rather than lumping all the knife ears into 'Codex Spess Elfs'.

To be perfectly honest, I'd probably welcome the Eldar books being fully merged at this point.

At least with Farseers, Autarchs, Shadowseers and Troupe Masters, Dark Eldar would finally have some worthwhile HQ choices.

Sure.

We should probably just merge them with the Primaris Marines and Chaos at the same time right? Then Chaos Marines could take decent troops choices, and you could use Doom with Intercessors.
It'd be great.

DE peeps:

You know Lelith is coming, right? We've seen her in two rumour engine pics so far (hair and knife). When she arrives, she will bring a book and backup.

To Harlokin's point though, Lelith has been working with Ynnari, and her appearance might mean DE or Eldar soup/ Ynnari.

As for all the other stuff, I'm not going to defend the way GW has treated the DE; we've lost a lot. But I will say that I haven't given up hope. I believe Lelith will continue to be DE, even if she becomes usable in Ynnari armies (Jain Zar may also become usable in Ynnari armies, but I think she'll remain CWE).

In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

With 30 armies listed on the website, it'll take more than a year to get to them all if they do one every two weeks. At one a month, we'll get the last one just a few months before 10th launches.

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:


In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

Great news! You might only have to wait till 2023 for your army book! How lucky do you all feel?

They've already written them apparently, and they can publish them as E-Books. So they're literally just making you wait three years for marketing reasons.

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:

You know Lelith is coming, right? We've seen her in two rumour engine pics so far (hair and knife).

Cool. So we're going from having a model for Lelith to having a model for Lelith. Someone fetch the balloons.

Let me know when there's any sign of Vect, The Duke, Baron Sathonyx, Lady Malys, The Decapitator. You know, the units we don't even have rules for in Legends because GW was too lazy to make models for them. Or Archons with Jetbikes/Skyboards. Or Haemonculi with Jetbikes/Skyboards. More units we used to have access to but no longer do.

Sorry but a new Lelith model is like offering a glass of water to a drowning man.

AdmiralHalsey wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:


In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

Great news! You might only have to wait till 2023 for your army book! How lucky do you all feel?

They've already written them apparently, and they can publish them as E-Books. So they're literally just making you wait three years for marketing reasons.

I've no issue with that, it allows me to spread the cost and them to get a better return on their work.

AdmiralHalsey wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:


In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

Great news! You might only have to wait till 2023 for your army book! How lucky do you all feel?

They've already written them apparently, and they can publish them as E-Books. So they're literally just making you wait three years for marketing reasons.

Rumour engine doesn't generally drop pics 3 years in advance; I actually think DE will be within year one, and maybe even before 2021. It's true that someone is going to have to wait 3 years- it cannot be otherwise. Keep in mind that these "marketing reasons" are what have sustained the company for 35 years- releasing everything all at once would flood the market and cripple the company, and then like so many others, the game would become a tiny little thing that only niche players know about, and they'd have to scale down production to the point where they were like every other company.

If you added Infinity, Bolt Action, X-wing and Battletech together, you're still looking at less than half of GW's market share. These "marketing reasons" you speak of are a big part of the reason why this game still exists at all. I don't like waiting either, but I'd rather that than have the company get stupid and disappear.

PenitentJake wrote:

AdmiralHalsey wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:


In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

Great news! You might only have to wait till 2023 for your army book! How lucky do you all feel?

They've already written them apparently, and they can publish them as E-Books. So they're literally just making you wait three years for marketing reasons.

Rumour engine doesn't generally drop pics 3 years in advance; I actually think DE will be within year one, and maybe even before 2021.

You toy with my hope at your peril

PenitentJake wrote:
DE peeps:

You know Lelith is coming, right? We've seen her in two rumour engine pics so far (hair and knife). When she arrives, she will bring a book and backup.

To Harlokin's point though, Lelith has been working with Ynnari, and her appearance might mean DE or Eldar soup/ Ynnari.

As for all the other stuff, I'm not going to defend the way GW has treated the DE; we've lost a lot. But I will say that I haven't given up hope. I believe Lelith will continue to be DE, even if she becomes usable in Ynnari armies (Jain Zar may also become usable in Ynnari armies, but I think she'll remain CWE).

In 8th, they released 24 codices in less than 3 years.

In lore, jain zar was also working with the ynnari.

Currently both are illegal to field in a ynnari detachment, sooooo...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Beardedragon wrote:
Thanks for all the replies.

How often are Forge world units added to the game then?

Also i hope they give some love for Goblin armies. They made a special detatchment that could work for fun armies, but then they removed it again from tournements for 9th which is just super sad..

I just got my hands on 4 grot tanks :(((

i always wanted to do a detatchment with Goblins

Hey just a note here:

Specialist DETACHMENTS are the thing that got removed. Theyre from the previous short set of campaign books. You paid 1cp to get a few traits and abilities.

Specialist MOBS are the ork version of custom chapter tactics. Those are still 100% legal. You can still play cheeky zoggers detachments.

Codex? Coming soon, for Necrons at least. Model? They get some new models.

Anyone else? Who knows? Never? Codex probably every month or so, models though...

 Platuan4th wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

Beardedragon wrote:
For instance, i play orks and i have no idea which units were added in 8th.

In 8th we got all the buggies, Da Red Gobbo, Thrakka and Makari.

Also the Wartrike.

I counted the wartrike as one of buggies


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Beardedragon wrote:
Thanks for all the replies.

How often are Forge world units added to the game then?

The current trend seems to be "never" unless you happen to be custodes who benefit from their 30k releases because they didn't lose their toys all over the galaxy like the rest of the bunch.