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it's outright nonsense, is what it is...
also , it's basically as Brian states, inconsistent to no end.

And it doesn't bode well for other armies imo.
I don't want to imagine Havocs with such stipulations in place OR CSM, because feth you you ain't having enough boltguns / melee equipment...

 Jidmah wrote:


Your point being... ?

Voss claimed that assembling the models properly is harder now, which is objectively false.

My point being if GW truly thinks its customers have gak for brains and cannot work out that not all options can be used at the same time then maybe, just maybe they should put legal squad loadouts on the box. The BLT one is legal now, but that exact same box cover, with 5 guys and two heavy weapons was not legal in 8th. It's not the only box either, the Eldar Start Collecting has a War Walker (or Wraithlord. I forget which without seeing the sprues) that cannot be built in such a way without the other kit existing in the same box as the kit only includes one of each weapon.

GW talk out of both side of their mouths with this anyway as evidenced by the BLT entry alone, if you buy one box it is impossible to give the whole squad axes or swords, yet that remains an option. I despise the direction this is going as converting and kitbashing are just a much a learned skill as painting is, yet GW seemingly want to stamp it out. GW's entire empire is built on it being "your guys" with parts being interchangeable (Jes Goodwin being a particular champion of this as seen by older SM kits and the revamped DE line to name but two) across multiple kits, but apparently that is now too hard for people to suss out, but it isn't if you play certain armies. Pick a lane GW.

So, you are just ranting about random things that are not related to either mine nor Voss' posts?

For what it's worth, they could have made all those new load-outs legal without limiting combi-weapons, plague knives and axes.

It's simply another step in the wrong direction. Isn't the first, won't be the last.
I, for myself, know that I have zero interest in any model which is not poseable or that I can't convert a little. Without the hobby and the huge options in term of models, why should I play 40k?
Yeah it's easier to find a game but the rules are a mess and when covid will end we will have to rebuilt our game scene from all but scratch anyway... It's a good chance to have less WH centric

I think I'll probably focus on Mordheim, BFG and maybe the occasional game of Apocalypse.

I assume the list of poll options is some sort of meta commentary on the PM wargear options?

The way they've done the PM and BLT options doesn't seem to benefit anyone. It's a confusing mess of text on the datasheet that makes understanding the options harder than before. GW seem to assume their own players are incapable of reading the rules before assembling the unit in the box, which seems to be the main driver behind this change. I don't think I've seen that from new players very often. In most cases they're pretty interested in all the various options their Codex provides and don't have any trouble understanding the really basic concept of a box containing multiple options that may be mutually exclusive.

Maybe GW could fix this supposed problem by not gating these unit options in a Codex and providing a proper list of restrictions in the box instructions? Maybe GW needs to focus more on the creative side of modelling?

Hard to provide input if one states you can't discuss one of the primary factors of why it is going in this direction.

Slipspace wrote:
I assume the list of poll options is some sort of meta commentary on the PM wargear options?

The way they've done the PM and BLT options doesn't seem to benefit anyone. It's a confusing mess of text on the datasheet that makes understanding the options harder than before. GW seem to assume their own players are incapable of reading the rules before assembling the unit in the box, which seems to be the main driver behind this change. I don't think I've seen that from new players very often. In most cases they're pretty interested in all the various options their Codex provides and don't have any trouble understanding the really basic concept of a box containing multiple options that may be mutually exclusive.

Maybe GW could fix this supposed problem by not gating these unit options in a Codex and providing a proper list of restrictions in the box instructions? Maybe GW needs to focus more on the creative side of modelling?

okey, but what is worse assembling a unit the wrong way, and then having to buy those 4 extra plasma parts for your combi bolters, or buying a unit and finding out that not only is there a way to build a basic load out unit with the parts which are in the box, on top of finding out that a combination of 1 melta, 1 plasma, 1 flamer is not a good one. It just sets up more traps for new players, and really hurts anyone who doesn't care about painting that much.

In fact I think that the whole play what you like is one of the worse illusions GW and part of the community give new players. Only worse one is the , next CA or FAQ will fix your bad stuff.

 Cybtroll wrote:
It's simply another step in the wrong direction. Isn't the first, won't be the last.
I, for myself, know that I have zero interest in any model which is not poseable or that I can't convert a little. Without the hobby and the huge options in term of models, why should I play 40k?
Yeah it's easier to find a game but the rules are a mess and when covid will end we will have to rebuilt our game scene from all but scratch anyway... It's a good chance to have less WH centric

I think I'll probably focus on Mordheim, BFG and maybe the occasional game of Apocalypse.

It's not even that. It's extremely easy to pose Plague Marines differently, I've magnetized most of them(luckily) and it's easy to change the arms between them. Which makes GWs decision even harder to understand. I just don't know why someone in 8th said, oh let's write knives and axes in there for every Marine and someone in 9th said, nah, let's instead do.... This... Whatever can describe the 9th edition PM datasheet.

It isn't even a consistent standard across - or within - units in the list.

For example, Cultists require a model which hasn't been available for about five years now.

Blightlords can only take one of each combi-weapon, but every model in the unit can take an axe, despite the kit only coming with three of them.

Slipspace wrote:
I assume the list of poll options is some sort of meta commentary on the PM wargear options?

That would have been clever. I just took the opinions from the other thread and ranked them from those that seemed to like the change most, to those that disliked it the most. I like the granularity although a simple number rank would have been more clear.

With 92 votes in it looks to me like:

15% View it mostly positively
18% Are mostly indifferent
56% View it negatively
10% Other (seems mostly negative?)

So less negative than I'd have expected, but still a large majority. And lots of good discussion so far.

There, I fixed it:

(Champion options unchanged)
If this unit contains 6 or less models, up to 2 Plague Marine's boltguns can each be replaced with 1 weapon from the Heavy Weapons list or 1 weapon from the Special Weapons list.
If this unit contains 7 or more models, up to 2 Plague Marine's boltguns can each be replaced with 1 weapon from the Heavy Weapons list.
If this unit contains 7 or more models, up to 2 Plague Marine's boltgun can each be replaced with 1 weapon from the Special Weapons list.
All Plague Marines in the unit can have their boltgun replaced by 1 option from the Melee Weapons list.
1 Plague Marine with a boltgun or a pair of plague knives can have an icon of despair. That boltgun cannot be replaced.
1 Plague Marine with a boltgun can have a sigil of corruption. That boltgun cannot be replaced.

Heavy Weapon List:
Plague Spitter
Blight Launcher

Special Weapon List:
Plasma gun
Plague belcher
Meltagun

Melee Weapon List:
Bubotic axe
Plague knife
Mace of contagion and Bubotic axe*
Plague cleaver*
Flail of corruption*

*no more than two of these weapons can be in a unit

Ta-da, everyone is happy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Slowroll wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
I assume the list of poll options is some sort of meta commentary on the PM wargear options?

That would have been clever. I just took the opinions from the other thread and ranked them from those that seemed to like the change most, to those that disliked it the most. I like the granularity although a simple number rank would have been more clear.

With 92 votes in it looks to me like:

15% View it mostly positively
18% Are mostly indifferent
56% View it negatively
10% Other (seems mostly negative?)

So less negative than I'd have expected, but still a large majority. And lots of good discussion so far.

Sadly, you ticked the "multiple answers" checkbox for the poll, so someone could just check all the negative answers and distort your numbers

 Jidmah wrote:
It's hilarious how this poll exclusively assumes that DG are the first army to be affected by this and that other armies aren't.

[x] It does affect me, I don't like it, and my orks have been affected by this exact treatment since 2014.

Welcome to xenos land my dear chaos friends.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Voss wrote:
It also has nothing at all to do with the problem at hand, which is the incoherent list of restrictions for Death Guard, which doesn't at all make them less powerful. It just makes a weird Tetris minigame out of assembling models.

Without excusing the mess of a rule they created, this is the one thing which is absolutely not true. If you assemble plague marines or blight lords according to their instructions, no matter which options you pick, you will end up with a legal unit. This was not the case with the previous codex, where you could build either box in away that fielding it was illegal without additional models.

Considering I've done it, it's entirely true. If you use the icon of despair, and went for two plague knives (which was an option in the old book) that model is now entirely invalid. He must have a bolt gun. You can also put together multiple restricted special weapons, which you can only have 1 of in a 7 man squad (in addition to the blight launcher and the plague whichever).

Even with two boxes of plague marines, I somehow ended up with multiple invalid models, regardless of whether I use them a 2 7 man squads, or a 10 man and toss in a random chaos marine with bolter to round out a 5 man.

It's an utter mess of restrictions without purpose.

Voss wrote:
Considering I've done it, it's entirely true. If you use the icon of despair, and went for two plague knives (which was an option in the old book) that model is now entirely invalid. He must have a bolt gun. You can also put together multiple restricted special weapons, which you can only have 1 of in a 7 man squad (in addition to the blight launcher and the plague whichever).

The instructions tell you to not put a knife on the sigil guy.

There also is no combination of special weapon that is illegal under the current rules. If you assemble all 7 guys according to the instructions, no matter which variant you pick for each of them, there no way to end up with an illegal load-out.

The only way to make illegal models or units under the new rules is by not following the instructions, which isn't that surprising. If I glue two pistols on Mortarion, he is an awesome, but illegal model as well.

I feel like this attitude towards trying to coral people out of using a bunch of creatively asembled models in actual games has been a trend for a while. This is just the latest and most stifling.

From a tournament gaming standpoint, I guess it helps make balancing easier and makes sense. But for casual games and people wit older units or stuff, it just kills the mood.

As someone who just builds and collects and not games, it makes no real difference to me since I build for me and not really to play, but as someone who still does like to see the state of actually playing, it is deterring me from wanting to actually play. I don't like this attitude where everything is shifting away from lets pick some options to did A build his squads exactly as the box suggests.

I think it is awful and it is clearly a trend because they did it in a less complicated, but still highly restrictive way with the new variants of Necron Destroyers too

Unless they plan to release another $80 book where they tell people all the specific and unnecessarily detailed ways they an bring in custom-nonconforming units, I see them just boxing out a big portion of their community.

I'm just going to ignore the error messages that Battlescribe gives me when i fill my blightlords with axes and combi flamers. It sucks but i don't actually give a feth about what GW has to say in that specific situation. I'll also send them emails to let them know that its a stupid decision.

It's bad.

It has to stop.

I eagerly await the new Dark Eldar codex. That will tell us how far this cancer has spread.

 Jidmah wrote:
The only way to make illegal models or units under the new rules is by not following the instructions, which isn't that surprising. If I glue two pistols on Mortarion, he is an awesome, but illegal model as well.

Like that's in any way the same thing...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
It's bad.

It has to stop.

I eagerly await the new Dark Eldar codex. That will tell us how far this cancer has spread.

 Jidmah wrote:
The only way to make illegal models or units under the new rules is by not following the instructions, which isn't that surprising. If I glue two pistols on Mortarion, he is an awesome, but illegal model as well.

Like that's in any way the same thing...

Do DE have anything left for this to spread to?

 Matt.Kingsley wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
It's bad.

It has to stop.

I eagerly await the new Dark Eldar codex. That will tell us how far this cancer has spread.

 Jidmah wrote:
The only way to make illegal models or units under the new rules is by not following the instructions, which isn't that surprising. If I glue two pistols on Mortarion, he is an awesome, but illegal model as well.

Like that's in any way the same thing...

Do DE have anything left for this to spread to?

Scourges are the canary in the coal mine mostly.

If they're limited to one splinter cannon, one dark lance, one shredder, one blaser, one haywire, one heat lance per squad, then we'll know.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
The only way to make illegal models or units under the new rules is by not following the instructions, which isn't that surprising. If I glue two pistols on Mortarion, he is an awesome, but illegal model as well.

Like that's in any way the same thing...

I'm not saying it's a good thing, but claiming that assembling the models according to the instruction manual leads to illegal models or units is just false.

There is plenty reason to hate this course of action, and there is absolutely no need to invent alternative facts.

As has been mentioned upthread, this feels like the latest in a line of ever clearer signs that GW wants nothing to do with the 'hobby' side of the...well, hobby. I can sympathize with the logic of "no model, no rules updates" and I'm not going to blame GW for removing kits/molds from active production, but this combined with the continued neglect of the Eldar/IG sculpts and the general bleeding of options from multiple factions leaves me uninterested in purchasing more GW products.

To be charitable, I could see this being a test-run of a fix to the long-running gripes about needing to buy multiple kits to make an otherwise legal loadout for a squad, but if so we can still condemn GW for choosing one of the dumbest possible means of fixing that (and, more egregiously, they've already chosen the best option: sell upgrade sprues containing extra gear/weapons/gubbins or small boxes of snapfit/ETB troops to fill the ranks).

It was in both the Marine and Sisters dexes - one of the few complaints about the Sisters dex was the godawful weapons chart for the Cannoness.

 waefre_1 wrote:
As has been mentioned upthread, this feels like the latest in a line of ever clearer signs that GW wants nothing to do with the 'hobby' side of the...well, hobby.

Was it Kirby that said something like the hobby was about purchasing their products? Also they said that they aren't a games company but a model company.

the_scotsman wrote:
Scourges are the canary in the coal mine mostly.
If they're limited to one splinter cannon, one dark lance, one shredder, one blaser, one haywire, one heat lance per squad, then we'll know.

Ugh, not looking forward to that. My feather-winged Scourges are anti-infantry with two splinter cannons while my bat-wing Scourges (which have a completely different paint scheme & heads, BTW) are anti-armor with two heat lances, a haywire cannon, and a blaster.

I'm still miffed that my Trueborn with all those shard carbines went illegal within one codex. Then again, Trueborn likely won't exist in the new codex unless they get a new name & kit. Drukhari Vileblade Trueborn Splintergunners anyone?

 Vankraken wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
As has been mentioned upthread, this feels like the latest in a line of ever clearer signs that GW wants nothing to do with the 'hobby' side of the...well, hobby.

Was it Kirby that said something like the hobby was about purchasing their products? Also they said that they aren't a games company but a model company.

"Objects of jewel-like wonder" is a direct quote from a Kirby-era preamble. So, yes.

 Vankraken wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
As has been mentioned upthread, this feels like the latest in a line of ever clearer signs that GW wants nothing to do with the 'hobby' side of the...well, hobby.

Was it Kirby that said something like the hobby was about purchasing their products? Also they said that they aren't a games company but a model company.

I think so, yeah. Looks like he might not've been the only C-level person at GW to think that way

 Jidmah wrote:

I'm not saying it's a good thing, but claiming that assembling the models according to the instruction manual leads to illegal models or units is just false.

There is plenty reason to hate this course of action, and there is absolutely no need to invent alternative facts.

well there is that thing where there isn't enough bolters and basic weapons for a unit of termintors in a single box, practicaly making taking of upgrades obligatory.

I wonder how this was playtested though. Someone set down with multiple army set ups of nurgle termintors, running one plasma, one flamer and one melta, played a few dozen games with them, and then the conclusion was that it is okey enough of a load out? Because the randomness of a single weapon vs running 5 of the same in a unit is huge.

ngl if they are wanting objects along the lines of "jewel-like wonder"........they have quite a ways to go. while it is a different industry, they might want to look at a level of detail akin to AutoArt's car models with working pistons, etc. THAT is an "object of jewel-like wonder."

It could just be me, but plastic sprues kits like these will likely never reach that level. I find it laughable that these could be "objects of jewel like wonder." FW resin models sure; I am seeing it on some of their models like their titans. however, I do not personally feel that GW products live up to the phrase of "jewel-like wonder". it literaly takes peoples hobbying abilities to make their products an object of jewel-like wonder." There's a severe disconnect somewhere if that's what they are insisting we view their products as.

Them: we provide you products of supreme value and detail.

us: you give us plastic sprues and WE use our HOBBYING SKILLS to make these look great

them: that doesn't matter we don't care about your hobbying skills. the real hobby here is purchasing our products.

us: im sorry what.

them: we are not a games company. we are a MODEL company

us: but Warhammer 40k IS A GAME

them: alright restrict what they can build to use in game. then be super critical of exactly what the models are holding so they must build exactly according to what they use and if the combo isnt legal according to our rules, dont let them use it or play.

mfw they want to turn a warGAMING hobby into a model hobby. I don't necessarily hate GW. they make an interesting universe and game, but they seem to have severely misinterpreted something. I almost find it odd they want to hold their products in such high regard yet expect us to do all the work to turn it into something worth enshrining and not want anything to do with the hobby side of things. This is the exact reason I dont really play 40k anymore. They just seem look down on, almost to completely look with disdain on, people's creative abilities with their game. And it's gettin worse. Scratchbuilt items were already hard to bring to use, unless you played orks, but now they are determining how you can build your characters. and apparently the instructions dont always provide a playable combination.

I know I deviated from the main topic of this discussion, but GW and their vision of how they seem to enshrine their products to a level they simply arent realistic in a hobby space that their products sit in.

i think i remember this: "We do no demographic research, we have no focus groups, we do not ask the market what it wants." - Kirby. CLEARLY explains the disconnect between them and the customer that desperately want to support them.

Personally I'm a fan of fewer bespoke rules in general. I really enjoy the modeling and customization, but so often it turns into a mess of trying to acquire enough of whatever weapon winds up on top to load out a squad based on efficiency.

I'd rather just have generic rules like "power weapons" and if I want to make them swords, and maces, or claws or whatever. I want models with cool bits and all, I just don't need them locked down by the rules.