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 Gadzilla666 wrote:
And that godawful, unbalanced, Night Lords Legion trait.

huh?

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
I think there should be room for both extremes, and a balance, for CSM.
Relatively recent Renegades, still piecing together what they're doing.

And they should just use the main SM codex because Renegades wouldn't suddenly forget they can use Landspeeders and Whirlwinds. The main Loyalist Scum codex needs to accommodate Huron and the Red Corsairs, the Crimson Slaughter, etc.

Yes and no Remember, "renegade" isn't exactly synonymous with "traitor" in the context of 40k - renegades are those who turned their back on the Imperium in favor of a different outlook, alignment, or philosophy, etc. including simply saying "yea we ain't down with your politics, we want to promote luxury automated gay space communism instead", whereas traitor means more specifically that you have turned to the worship of chaos.

The loyalist SM book is definitely appropriate for renegades (or at least recent unaligned renegades... if your homebrew renegade chapter buggered off and joined the Tau or has been flying solo for an extended period of time and is making due with makeshift/looted weapons and wargear, etc. then maybe you're a bit out of luck) - but its not necessarily appropriate for *traitors* except perhaps the most recent and newest of converts who have not yet been twisted and mutated or possessed or gained access to heretical weapons and wargear, etc. If you're trying to model a traitor chapter like the red corsairs who are ~100+ years into betrayal then you're at a bit of a loss, as they are far enough gone that they would have access to things like Defilers and Forgefiends and Chaos Spawn, etc. but not far enough gone that they wouldn't still have some land speeders, whirlwinds, and thunderfire cannons kicking around.

The CSM book on the other hand is a bit confused as to what its trying to represent. Arguably it works best for an older traitor chapter/warband thats 2-3+ millennia removed from Imperial service and has run through their inventories of landspeeders and whirlwinds and other theoretically hard to maintain weapons and vehicles and thus only has access to the most robust pieces of common kit, alongside their inventory of chaos kit... but then it gives you access to reaper autocannons and rotorcannons, etc. that are Heresy era vintage and which they wouldn't otherwise have access to unless they looted it or whatever (which you can simply choose not to take), and several of the unit organizations and loadouts don't quite align with how they would have been structured during their time in service to the Emperor (arguably that can be explained by a loosening in their obedience to the Codex Astartes, etc). In terms of representing the actual traitor *legions* I would argue that the CSM book is awful at it, alongside the Thousand Sons and Death Guard books. The units and organization present in the Chaos book don't actually mirror the organization of the legions themselves - while it does (currently) allow you to field chaos marines in units of 20, the book largely lacks the means to represent the myriad specialist units and formations that these legions had access to before they fell. It seems logical to me that the legions would have continued to structure themselves and fight in a manner similar to how they did during the heresy era, at least to some extent, but the CSM book doesn't adequately represent that, and while it strips the legions of access to more "modern" post-Codex loyalist wargear and units, it doesn't entirely substitute those losses with pieces of kit that the legionnaires would have had access to during the heresy era that have since fell out of favor with the loyalist chapters.

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
I just noticed on the reaper auto cannon that the feed consists of parallel strands of bullets. As far as I can see it has a single rotating barrel. So how do you feed it 2 bullets at a time and not have it jam?

Might be two barrels firing, top and bottom, Russian twin autocannons for one have very simple and robust mechanism where recoil of one side loads and prepares the other one to fire. It's cheap and easy way to raise your rate of fire without insane rpms that would literally spin the gun apart.

Better question is, why S3 gun from HH that was only good for chaff clearing magically become S5 heavy infantry killer in 40K?

EviscerationPlague wrote:
And they should just use the main SM codex because Renegades wouldn't suddenly forget they can use Landspeeders and Whirlwinds.

They would, actually. Both are very intensive in both materiel and infrastructure weapons systems that require tons of maintenance, spare parts, and specialized ammunition that can only be provided if you have a stable base of operations and supply network from friendly forge worlds. Something both renegades and heretic CSM would lack. Whirlwind is completely useless if you can't procure missiles. Too bad logistics and logic don't work on wishful thinking, then CSM would be most powerful faction in the setting

chaos0xomega wrote:
The fluff is pretty clear that that is *not* what they are supposed to be.

This. Also, what fanfiction brigade doesn't seem to get, is the simple fact that CHAOS. IS. NOT. BENEVOLENT. Chaos "gods" are literally bloated parasites whose "followers" are glorified snacks and footstools. They are given a first dose from a drug dealer, then are squeezed dry, not showered with gifts. For each demon prince (which is pretty much being eaten by said parasite and your corpse being worn by a tentacle connecting to "god" body) there are 10.000 chaos spawn who thought they will gain power only to end up as bloated, lacking everything of use meatbag devoid of any strength or intelligence.

The very idea being that demonstrably thinks that you're at best a bag of chips to be eaten later will make you stronger is laughable. Yes, sometimes you will get "good job" token if you're especially good at feeding said parasite but it's rare and very much not the norm. And even then it's more likely that you will get something that makes you think you're getting stronger while being opposite (or you're so deluded by then you think growing extra faces and spikes is cool and beg for more).

There is a reason why Iron Warriors surgically remove these "gifts" and it's not because they want to be weak. They are one of the few somewhat sane CSM factions left and have common sense to see the "gifts" for what they actually are, cancerous tumors hastening your demise. Not Peter Parker spider powers they are in bad fanfics

 Irbis wrote:
Might be two barrels firing, top and bottom, Russian twin autocannons for one have very simple and robust mechanism where recoil of one side loads and prepares the other one to fire. It's cheap and easy way to raise your rate of fire without insane rpms that would literally spin the gun apart.

Better question is, why S3 gun from HH that was only good for chaff clearing magically become S5 heavy infantry killer in 40K?

Because a Chaincannon isn't a Rotorcannon. It's much bigger.

Ah yes. "Fanfiction Brigade". This is where we are going in this topic.

Not Online!!! wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
I think there should be room for both extremes, and a balance, for CSM.

Relatively recent Renegades, still piecing together what they're doing.

And they should just use the main SM codex because Renegades wouldn't suddenly forget they can use Landspeeders and Whirlwinds. The main Loyalist Scum codex needs to accommodate Huron and the Red Corsairs, the Crimson Slaughter, etc.

the best thing about the SM dex is, that it has more support and if you wanna go legion, you get all the ancient stuff like grav guns and such, which chaos marines just forgot, outside of FW of course.

I'm all for the Traitor Legions losing access to things like Grav Guns and Land Speeders to keep army identity in check. I'm opposed to Renegades and Traitor Chapters losing them though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Irbis wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
And they should just use the main SM codex because Renegades wouldn't suddenly forget they can use Landspeeders and Whirlwinds.

They would, actually. Both are very intensive in both materiel and infrastructure weapons systems that require tons of maintenance, spare parts, and specialized ammunition that can only be provided if you have a stable base of operations and supply network from friendly forge worlds. Something both renegades and heretic CSM would lack. Whirlwind is completely useless if you can't procure missiles. Too bad logistics and logic don't work on wishful thinking, then CSM would be most powerful faction in the setting

Ah yes, Renegades would never be able to salvage ammo for Multi-Meltas on their Havocs and Bolt Ammo for their Land Raider Hurricane Bolters, and yet somehow always procure Autocannon ammo, Hades Autocannon ammo, and Chaincannon ammo.

It's just stupid inconsistency. Legions need a dedicated codex, period. Renegades and Heretics aren't anything the Loyalist codex can't handle with just a few dedicated pages for swapping keywords and a couple evil unit entries.

Ah my old enemies; "Chaos Space Marines don't have Multi-Meltas and Plasma guns for whatever reason" and "Red Corsairs (an explicitly Chaos-ified faction who have not resembled loyalists with red crosses over their aquillas for four editions now) need to be moved into the Space Marine codex", we meet again.

 Gert wrote:

 Irbis wrote:
Might be two barrels firing, top and bottom, Russian twin autocannons for one have very simple and robust mechanism where recoil of one side loads and prepares the other one to fire. It's cheap and easy way to raise your rate of fire without insane rpms that would literally spin the gun apart.

Better question is, why S3 gun from HH that was only good for chaff clearing magically become S5 heavy infantry killer in 40K?

Because a Chaincannon isn't a Rotorcannon. It's much bigger.

Took them 10000 years to develop that update, not bad

 Irbis wrote:

This. Also, what fanfiction brigade doesn't seem to get, is the simple fact that CHAOS. IS. NOT. BENEVOLENT. Chaos "gods" are literally bloated parasites whose "followers" are glorified snacks and footstools. They are given a first dose from a drug dealer, then are squeezed dry, not showered with gifts. For each demon prince (which is pretty much being eaten by said parasite and your corpse being worn by a tentacle connecting to "god" body) there are 10.000 chaos spawn who thought they will gain power only to end up as bloated, lacking everything of use meatbag devoid of any strength or intelligence.

The very idea being that demonstrably thinks that you're at best a bag of chips to be eaten later will make you stronger is laughable. Yes, sometimes you will get "good job" token if you're especially good at feeding said parasite but it's rare and very much not the norm. And even then it's more likely that you will get something that makes you think you're getting stronger while being opposite (or you're so deluded by then you think growing extra faces and spikes is cool and beg for more).

There is a reason why Iron Warriors surgically remove these "gifts" and it's not because they want to be weak. They are one of the few somewhat sane CSM factions left and have common sense to see the "gifts" for what they actually are, cancerous tumors hastening your demise. Not Peter Parker spider powers they are in bad fanfics

But the chaos gods are also very broad concepts echoed into the warp by the whole of sentience and not cartoon villains ? I mean, your outlook sounds a lot like the in universe propaganda
I agree that the Chaos gods are not benevolent. But Chaos as a concept is pretty neutral.
Also it's pretty disingenuous to describe Daemon Princes that way. They literally become part of their gods and are made of warp stuff but they obviously keep their personality. They aren't "Tentacles under a trench coat".

chaos0xomega wrote:
The CSM book on the other hand is a bit confused as to what its trying to represent.

It's trying to represent the models in the box. No more. No less.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
And that godawful, unbalanced, Night Lords Legion trait.

huh?

You see the supposed future Night Lords trait on page 1 of this thread? Think about what that'll do to a "low leadership" faction like Orks, then think about what it won't do against factions like Custodes, loyalists, Thousand Sons, and Knights. Sound balanced and fun to you? Because it certainly doesn't to me.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
And that godawful, unbalanced, Night Lords Legion trait.

huh?

You see the supposed future Night Lords trait on page 1 of this thread? Think about what that'll do to a "low leadership" faction like Orks, then think about what it won't do against factions like Custodes, loyalists, Thousand Sons, and Knights. Sound balanced and fun to you? Because it certainly doesn't to me.

idk, makes sense to me that a faction that spooks easily is more affected than a faction that doesnt. Its the same than the -1 to hit factions.


And anyway, i'm more hype about the movement bonuses part. If the legion follows the PA trend of using LD to get buffs/debuffs then i'll be happy.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
And that godawful, unbalanced, Night Lords Legion trait.

huh?

You see the supposed future Night Lords trait on page 1 of this thread? Think about what that'll do to a "low leadership" faction like Orks, then think about what it won't do against factions like Custodes, loyalists, Thousand Sons, and Knights. Sound balanced and fun to you? Because it certainly doesn't to me.

idk, makes sense to me that a faction that spooks easily is more affected than a faction that doesnt. Its the same than the -1 to hit factions.


And anyway, i'm more hype about the movement bonuses part. If the legion follows the PA trend of using LD to get buffs/debuffs then i'll be happy.

It'll be debilitating for some factions, and completely useless against others. Neither of those sounds fun to me. How exactly would you use this against Custodes, who are all L11?

But your Legion is the 'Scary' Legion. So sayeth GW's Department of Flanderisation!

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
But your Legion is the 'Scary' Legion. So sayeth GW's Department of Flanderisation!

Bgd department, not the flanderisation one. That one works on WE.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
And that godawful, unbalanced, Night Lords Legion trait.

huh?

You see the supposed future Night Lords trait on page 1 of this thread? Think about what that'll do to a "low leadership" faction like Orks, then think about what it won't do against factions like Custodes, loyalists, Thousand Sons, and Knights. Sound balanced and fun to you? Because it certainly doesn't to me.

idk, makes sense to me that a faction that spooks easily is more affected than a faction that doesnt. Its the same than the -1 to hit factions.


And anyway, i'm more hype about the movement bonuses part. If the legion follows the PA trend of using LD to get buffs/debuffs then i'll be happy.

It'll be debilitating for some factions, and completely useless against others. Neither of those sounds fun to me. How exactly would you use this against Custodes, who are all L11?

A lot of high-leadership armies still cap out around leadership 10, and we are beyond the days where HQ's and such use their leadership instead of individual troops for leadership tests.

Night Lords get base -2 leadership and -1 combat attrition. Raptors hit them with another -1 leadership. So, units that are leadership 10 are now down to leadership 7, which means they start rolling for morale after only 2 models lost.

So, how do you get past that last nugget of leadership to get them to leadership 6 so the assault bonus goes off? Well, I bet you there'll be some relics, warlord traits, and stratagems (each legion is getting quite a lot of each apparently) that'll help you get there so that you can run in with +1 to wound on your melee stuff.

So, yeah, getting that particular buff against things like Custodes and Necrons is going to be tough...

But most Space Marines are leadership 8.

Yeah. Primaris Space Marines of all flavors, aside HQ's, are leadership 8. Getting to leadership 6 is easy, just be in range with your Night Lords and... boom, you're getting +1 to wound in melee and with pistols and assault weapons against the most common faction you'll ever face in your career of warhammer.

Some factions, like Sisters of Battle, Grey Knights, and Imperial Knights have a beefier leadership of 9 for some of their units (but still 8 for others) which means you'll have to use a relic, warlord trait, or maybe stratagem to get them down tot hat juicy leadership 6. All space marine factions, and that includes Chaos Marines, Thousand Sons, and Death Guard, cap out at 8 for most of their squads. Astra Militarum, Genestealer Cult, Adeptus Mechanicus, and Orks are even worse in many ways. Many vehicles for a lot of these factions also cap out at leadership 8, which means +1 to wound against vehicles in melee... sounds pretty juicy if you're rocking things like power fists, or even lightning claws that suddenly are wounding tanks on 4's instead of 5's, assuming the buff applies against vehicles and monsters too.

Is it situational? Yes. But think of it more like how Tau and Necron and Drukhari have no psychic phase. Some factions just aren't going to participate in that phase. Similarly, Custodes, Necron, and Tyranids with synapse are unlikely to participate in the morale phase...

But, I'll live for the day I can take a 5 man squad of Custodian Guard at leadership 11, bring them down to leadership 8 with raptors + Night Lords, make them lose 4 of their squad and have the last one botch a roll on a 5+ and flee.

Oh, and if you still can't tolerate the Night Lords traits, I'm sure there will be plenty of options in the 'make your own warband' rules for you to adjust them to your flavor.

Csm troops can now purchase a book that makes the unit a psychic unit. Also they can have a 2 handed chainaxe option

The CSM Upgrade Sprue for Killteam basically confirms this part of the rumour

I feel like we have this discussion about Night Lords every time CSM get a new codex, with the same "just stack debuffs" argument that never works out when the book lands anyway.

I really wonder what they are going to do to base marines/legionaries.

The CSM doctrines (exploding 6s) are weaker than their marine equivalents (+1 ap). But GW math isn't going to realise that.

arcanum wrote:
I really wonder what they are going to do to base marines/legionaries.

The CSM doctrines (exploding 6s) are weaker than their marine equivalents (+1 ap). But GW math isn't going to realise that.

That's dependent on targets and tbh is a better mechanic over all than stacking ap. But the rumour poster covered the changes to the profiles.

 Arbitrator wrote:
I feel like we have this discussion about Night Lords every time CSM get a new codex, with the same "just stack debuffs" argument that never works out when the book lands anyway.

Except now GW figured out a way to play with leadership that isnt purely to force checks. Getting bonuses against spooked opponents is thematic for night lords, Spooking a Custodes is harder than spooking a grot. i'm super happy with what the legion trait is rumored to be. And in anycase, i can't fathom how one can complain about that upgrade when we have the current one that does even less

arcanum wrote:
I really wonder what they are going to do to base marines/legionaries.

The CSM doctrines (exploding 6s) are weaker than their marine equivalents (+1 ap). But GW math isn't going to realise that.

Clearly you have not done the math yourself or else you would not be saying that. +1ap is supperior only for ap0 and ap1. ap2 is a bit split, but everything ap2 and above is superior for us. also -1 to hit does not impact us, it does SM doctrine. invul save totally neuter +1ap, it does nothing against our new doctrine.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Edit: I will say, T7 Terminators is kinda bonkers, though. That's... That's literally Dreadnought or Rhino tough, Togusa.

If GW had actually USED their new design space, it'd work better, but as-is, while I like your direction, I do think you went overboard.

We sort of have that with DA transhuman. They're effectively a much higher toughness, but the curve against various strengths isn't as severe. It's actually a much better application of the rules than just pushing up toughness.

 blood reaper wrote:
Ah my old enemies; "Chaos Space Marines don't have Multi-Meltas and Plasma guns for whatever reason" and "Red Corsairs (an explicitly Chaos-ified faction who have not resembled loyalists with red crosses over their aquillas for four editions now) need to be moved into the Space Marine codex", we meet again.

Refute the points presented or admit you're wrong.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
Ah my old enemies; "Chaos Space Marines don't have Multi-Meltas and Plasma guns for whatever reason" and "Red Corsairs (an explicitly Chaos-ified faction who have not resembled loyalists with red crosses over their aquillas for four editions now) need to be moved into the Space Marine codex", we meet again.

Refute the points presented or admit you're wrong.

It's cool how exceptionally hostile the tone is of this to my semi-joking facetious message about 'enemies'.

But in general I have some basic problems with the logic that for whatever reason renegades and legions can't be in the same book.

It's very clear the Red Corsairs aren't just 'normal Space Marines but renegade', for example and they haven't been like that since what, 3rd ed (which has a few images of normal Space Marines with their Imperial icons crossed out with red paint).

They make full use of Daemons, Possessed, Daemon Engines, Huron wears a plethora of Chaos Symbols and is an open sorcerer. I don't think the Marine codex needs to have all these entries (or really any more than it already does). If you want to play 'standard' non-Chaos aligned renegades you can just use the existing Space Marine codex as is, since its perfectly suitable for fielding the Tyrant's Legion.

And what about all the Traitors who turned like, before M.41? Plenty of those guys are full on renegades on par with the existing Legions. The Corpus Brethren, for example, sound like they're pretty messed up dudes - as do pretty much every other SM chapter who took a trip into the Eye.

Incidentally I don't understand how the Legions wouldn't have access to grav guns. Isn't material captured all the time in war? I mean they had access to multi-meltas and plasma cannons in the Heresy - do these all suddenly stop working? Why not just make it they can have less of these than Loyalists can.

This fixation on faction identity seems kinda silly. I'm glad other wargames don't fall into this rabbit hole (another major benefit of historicals, imo).

 blood reaper wrote:
But in general I have some basic problems with the logic that for whatever reason renegades and legions can't be in the same book.

It's very clear the Red Corsairs aren't just 'normal Space Marines but renegade', for example and they haven't been like that since what, 3rd ed (which has a few images of normal Space Marines with their Imperial icons crossed out with red paint).

They make full use of Daemons, Possessed, Daemon Engines, Huron wears a plethora of Chaos Symbols and is an open sorcerer. I don't think the Marine codex needs to have all these entries (or really any more than it already does).

If we're going on historical precedent, the first appearances of the Red Corsairs made it completely clear they're solidly chaos, between Huron's mechanics on the table and the representation of him both on the cover of Into the Maelstrom and in the titular short story. Also working with that model, I felt they actually did a great job representing a relatively recently turned force, where (IIRC) it was essentially a CSM army where they had access to a limited number of marine options with a tax. A lot of marine options are representable pretty easily through CSM but it allows a very simple patch.

Likewise, the kinda bland 3rd ed corsairs were IMHO obviously just encouraging more variety and kitbashing, and trying to make space for more than the narrow 9 original legions, and Crimson Slaughter as the starter set represent another obvious attempt to integrate modern traitors-- I still don't know why they didn't go with the red demon-summoning marines, the red slaughter marines, or the red recent traitor marines in favor of the red marines with a name that sounds even more like a sports team than most GW factions... but the point is, it's clear that even recent traitors have always been mechanically aligned with CSM, not regular marines, and arguably with faction identity tied to stratagems now this is even more appropriate than attempting to represent traitors through organizational structure/tactics of loyalists. The only area where rules fail to match is through gear options.

 spiralingcadaver wrote:

 blood reaper wrote:
But in general I have some basic problems with the logic that for whatever reason renegades and legions can't be in the same book.

It's very clear the Red Corsairs aren't just 'normal Space Marines but renegade', for example and they haven't been like that since what, 3rd ed (which has a few images of normal Space Marines with their Imperial icons crossed out with red paint).

They make full use of Daemons, Possessed, Daemon Engines, Huron wears a plethora of Chaos Symbols and is an open sorcerer. I don't think the Marine codex needs to have all these entries (or really any more than it already does).

If we're going on historical precedent, the first appearances of the Red Corsairs made it completely clear they're solidly chaos, between Huron's mechanics on the table and the representation of him both on the cover of Into the Maelstrom and in the titular short story. Also working with that model, I felt they actually did a great job representing a relatively recently turned force, where (IIRC) it was essentially a CSM army where they had access to a limited number of marine options with a tax. A lot of marine options are representable pretty easily through CSM but it allows a very simple patch.

Likewise, the kinda bland 3rd ed corsairs were IMHO obviously just encouraging more variety and kitbashing, and trying to make space for more than the narrow 9 original legions, and Crimson Slaughter as the starter set represent another obvious attempt to integrate modern traitors-- I still don't know why they didn't go with the red demon-summoning marines, the red slaughter marines, or the red recent traitor marines in favor of the red marines with a name that sounds even more like a sports team than most GW factions... but the point is, it's clear that even recent traitors have always been mechanically aligned with CSM, not regular marines, and arguably with faction identity tied to stratagems now this is even more appropriate than attempting to represent traitors through organizational structure/tactics of loyalists. The only area where rules fail to match is through gear options.

I feel a basic 'you can take X equipment from this codex' would be fine for all the Legions, to be quite honest. It also encourages conversions, which are cool, and avoids making the Space Marine codex any larger.

Of course the game is at this point never going to do anything this sensible, and we can look forward to an increasingly sterile hell for all factions to sink into.

Sigh, yeah, I feel like esp. because of all of the variations on marines they've been pushing hard to make the factions (or units) unique through limiting options. Yeah, I get how it's mechanically advantageous to narrow what you're working with, but it often doesn't feel like the 40k setting I prefer. I know it's a matter of taste to a degree, but I'm not a fan.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:
Except now GW figured out a way to play with leadership that isnt purely to force checks. Getting bonuses against spooked opponents is thematic for night lords, Spooking a Custodes is harder than spooking a grot. i'm super happy with what the legion trait is rumored to be. And in anycase, i can't fathom how one can complain about that upgrade when we have the current one that does even less

I'm gonna steal Gadzilla's thunder here and say the Night Lords can be more than just Spooky, especially considering that Morale still isn't a big player with the upped lethality of 9th.
For Space Marines specifically, ATSKNF means Combat Attrition modifiers are just flat out ignored, or if they are Dark Angels you auto pass them.
For Custodes, -2 Ld isn't a big thing for a unit with Ld 11 and a unit size of 5 where you will likely lose 1 or 2 models/combat phase and will obliterate the thing that tried to kill you.
Sure it's great for weak squishies but there are also lots of armies that can already boost Ld, nullify Combat Attrition tests, or buff morale. Compared to something like HH's Talent for Murder where NL gets buffs in combat vs units with fewer models, it's pretty naff that these rumours say that NL get Ld debuffs and +1 to Charges and Advance, the latter of which makes no sense when they are a Legion of cowardly opportunists.

Yep, there are a lot of ways to represent opportunism, disruption, and general sneakiness other than just being scary. Scary is fine, but minor penalties are pretty unimpressive as their central thing in a game where so often factions are defined by being brave (or otherwise unaffected by losses).