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I'm keen to have a little retrospective discussion about what edition Codex people felt were "best" for each of the different races and factions.

Obviously "best" is going to be subjective and variable - so please qualify your responses. Best could be taken to mean any or all of the following:

* Most internally balanced with various good/fun/interesting army builds and options

* Strongest and/or most-competitively powerful

* Most thematic, fluffy, lore-aligned

If anyone wants a little chart showing the past codexes for 3rd-7th edition see below - but of course RT, 1st ed, 8th/9th is all fair play too!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1m5Opo0yRVuHDfnqBTlSDKExlxzpL20rL0jL5d-TeZ2g/edit?usp=sharing

============================================

Here's my take on laying it out (feel free to copy as a template)

* Space Marines: 4th edition had some fun possibilities because of the customizable chapter traits. But 5th had a nice expansion to the unit rosters and I think the internal balance was a bit better overall.
-- Blood Angels: 4th
-- Dark Angels: 4th
-- Space Wolves: 7th wulfen edtion - power level (relatively) felt a little toned down and unit roster was nicely expanded. Feel like there were tons of fun options in the list.
-- Other successor chapters

* Imperial Guard: 3.5 edition with regimental doctrines. Guard felt most thematic to me here.
* Sisters of Battle: 3rd edition Witch Hunters - I loved the combination of SoB with all the other units, the faith system.
* Grey Knights: 3rd edition Daemonunters - before the power creep!

* Chaos Marines: 3.5 edition which had the books of chaos and the crazy levels of customization that was possible. Also loved that essentially Daemons's were just integrated into the Chaos book rather than being their own separate army.
* Chaos Daemons: none? I liked Daemons as part of Chaos Marines.

* Orks: 2nd edition. Going way back on this one. Orks felt the most orky in this edition. Loved that distinct Ork clan units were a core part of the unit lineup. Second place would be 3rd edition for the Feral Orks list
* Tyranids: Not sure to be honest! I think 5th edition in terms of flavor and mycetic assault spore/pods

* Tau Empire: 6th edition before the craziness of Riptides and larger mechs messed things up.
* Necrons: not sue.

* Eldar Craftworld: 6th edition felt pretty good - but was over-tuned as well. I did like 3rd edition with the craftworld supplement.
* Dark Eldar: 5th edition. It was a pretty needed expansion of the line up and had a lot of fun options in it.

Obviously there's also new factions (mostly showing up in 7th edition) like Custodes, Skitarri, Cult Mechanics, Genestealer Cults, etc.. Feel free to discuss those as well!

Cheers!

Lol most Tyranid players hated the 5th edition codex.

Best Tyranid codex is 4th and 9th.

4th had the best upgrade options but with an unit roster that with hindsight feels very limited. 9th is a considerably larger codex in which most things have a role although it doesn't have as many upgrades as 4th (although arguably many of the 4th edition upgrades are just base on 9th).

Ah, yes. Grey Knights just loved being absolute garbage tier with Codex: Daemonhunters.

Chiming in for 4th edition orks. A fairly basic codex that supported a multitude of play styles and got rid of the most egregious elements of randumb from previous ones.

Also the last time orks felt like orks and were ti be feared outside of spamming gimmicks (lucky stick green tide, out of los buggy gunline, ect)

 Lord Damocles wrote:
Ah, yes. Grey Knights just loved being absolute garbage tier with Codex: Daemonhunters.

Yeah, ultimately, with some better internal balance, Matt Ward's codex was a lot better written than the Daemonhunters codex.

For space wolves, I would have to go with the 1st edition army list (not codex as in RT they didn't do those)
When compared to a standard Space marine army (post balance update when they went from T3 to T4) Space wolves had bonkers special rules, and were essentially marines +++
Long fangs were essentially what would now be BS 1+, Wolf Guard terminators had a -1+ save and could join other units. Blood claws doubled their attacks on the charge (combat was very different, so it doesn't mean the same as now)

Sisters of battle, I would go with 2nd ed, the first codex. mainly because of the Frateris Militia entry which basically allowed you to use any troops you had a mind to, Cavalry, archers, mobs of civilians, anything

Chaos marines, I loved the 2nd ed one, mainly due to the sheer number of options, and the fact it was a huge book.

In general though, I quite like all the 3rd ed Codices, they quite neatly defined what each army was about. You could level the accusation that they were a bit boring, but the number of special rules was minimal, the power levels while a little inconsistent were still a lot closer than what we have now. there was minimal fluff, but the books were priced very reasonably. it was only from 4th onwards that you really began to see the armies become wildly inconsistent in their power, and that depended very much on which member of the rules team wrote a book. if a fan boy wrote a book, they would be bonkers, and if the same fanboy wrote a book for an army they didn't like, it would be rubbish.

Orks, 1st edition hands down, 3 books and some of the most characterful and entertaining rules written. Pure orky joy, nothing since has even come close to how good these books are.

I thought the 5th edition book for Space Wolves was the best. Introduced sagas, and had a lot of great flavour. Even if it was part of Razorback Edition 40k.

I Started in 3rd edition, so I have a nostalgic love of those books, but Balance was all over the place lol. The 3.5 CSM book was absolutely broken, and Necrons (on release). I did enjoy the Necrons book.


Nightmare Shroud, Deceiver, and pariahs led to a lot of fun morale shenanigans I enjoyed.

Grey Knights in 3rd were horrible. Shrouding was the most useless special rule, and was a waste of time rolling for with every attack. The Matt Ward book has it's detractors, but had tons of charcter, and the Inquisition part of the book was a lot of fun. Loved the special characters too, especially the terminator captain which summoned ghosts.

 Tyran wrote:
Lol most Tyranid players hated the 5th edition codex.

Best Tyranid codex is 4th and 9th.

4th had the best upgrade options but with an unit roster that with hindsight feels very limited. 9th is a considerably larger codex in which most things have a role although it doesn't have as many upgrades as 4th (although arguably many of the 4th edition upgrades are just base on 9th).

Yeah I agree with this.
The 3rd ed tyranid codex was kinda neat with its mutable creature rules (want to put a venom cannon on a termagant, or make one into a synapse creature? Sure why not!). But I think the 4th ed codex had the best mix of customisation, presentation, and internal balance. The 3e and 4e codexes also had some good takes on things like weapons. For instance the deathspitter being a single shot blast weapon, kinda like a big grenade launcher, fits how it's described in the lore much better than the pseudo heavy bolter that later editions turned it into.

The 5th ed codex added a ton of extra units, in exchange for removing nearly all customisability/unit upgrades. Also the internal balance of this codex was truly dire. It had a few neat ideas in it, but overall it was a big step down from 4th edition.
However it wasn't as bad as the 6th edition codex. That one nearly made me quit 40k. It was pretty much just a reprint of the 5th edition codex with a bunch of units and options removed, and mechanics broken. For instance they broke how tyranid melee weapons stacked, so your 4 armed creatures then had to decide whether they're attacking with their upper arms or lower arms, while the other set dangled uselessly. They didn't get around to trying to fix this until the current 9th ed codex (although even now it's not fixed for all loadouts. You still don't get much from mixing rending claws and boneswords for instance).

Definitely 3.5 for CSM as a whole. But for Night Lords specifically: The Liber Hereticus for HH 2.0. Best rules that the Legion has ever had, even better than 3.5.

3rd ed Necrons fluff was basically Tyranids except they're older, better and smarter robot-Tyranids, personally, I am not a fan. 5th edition introduced the new lore which made Necrons more of a tragic thing, put Necrons in focus and made their society more unique which I really enjoy. 7th introduced Decurions which did not make much sense. 8th edition introduced the Tesserarion which was terrible lore and expanded on the Dynasties. 9th edition got rid of the Tesserarion which is nice but also failed to provide much lore for the new units released.

In terms of relative power I do not know about 3rd ed, it might have been S-tier for a while, but I get the feeling that it was more A-tier and then fell all the way to C-tier with unfavourable core rules changes. 5th edition came out as B-tier and was S-tier in early 6th because of core rules changes and fell to around an A-tier because of power creep catching up to Necrons. 7th was the same story as 6th. Index had a few decent units but overall terrible. 8th had one A-tier build that got nerfed leaving the faction at a D-tier, with enough buffs they eventually climbed to a B-tier. 9th edition was pretty C-tier on release and has recently gotten to A-tier with errata and pts reductions.

In terms of internal balance 9th is above average for Necrons codexes, 5th and 8th were below average.

9th has the best best layout (crusade sandwich being the only negative), 7th had the worst layout (let's put the Detachment where you put Formation in 50 pages away from the Formations you put in that Detachment).

9th removed several fun rules from 8th (Deceiver and Obyron), but also fixed some unfun rules from 8th (Monolith and Night Scythe). 5th introduced a lot rules that could combo together in healthy ways (map-wide difficult ground getting turned into map-wide dangerous terrain and AP2 fleshbane flamers).

5th added new models but they were all meh. 9th added lots of cool models but also downgraded the two best sculpts in the Necron range.

Overall I would go with 5th as the best Necrons codex, it was also the one that got me into Necrons.

 Mezmorki wrote:


Here's my take on laying it out (feel free to copy as a template)

-- Blood Angels: 4th

* Tyranids: Not sure to be honest! I think 5th edition in terms of flavor and mycetic assault spore/pods

* Eldar Craftworld: 6th edition felt pretty good - but was over-tuned as well. I did like 3rd edition with the craftworld supplement.

These are the three factions I had the most experience with back in those days so my comments will be limited to them. Also, I never played 3rd, 7th or later so I'm further limited in comparing those books across the editions. I have 3rd edition codices for these factions, but for collecting purposes.

Blood Angels. I also preferred the 4th edition codex to the 5th edition one. I think the 5th edition book was stronger overall with point cost reductions on many units and upgrades. When the 5th edition Vanilla SM book came out there were a lot of folks on the BA boards on B&C trying to wring some BA flavor out of the book because of the perceived power creep. This was early on before Salamander builds emerged as the best. I tried like everyone else, but found I couldn't get the same feel and stayed with the WD dex. When the bloody book of bloody blood came out in 5th there were changes I liked and changes I didn't. The biggest deficit for me was probably death company. Jump pack DC were a staple of my 4th ed lists. The 5th ed book made them a liability by not letting a chaplain control them.

Tyranids. I had high hopes for the 5th edition book. It added a lot of cool, new stuff like Trygons and Tervigons. The warrior prime was new. And who can forget the humble pyrovore? Carnifexes got hammered hard, but were allowed to be taken in very overpriced broods. I was never able to get builds I really liked out this book. Assaulting into cover in 5th edition rules was a huge hole in the book. IIRC only a carnifex with spine banks and lictors could actually charge into cover and not get punished for it. 4th edition had a lot more customization on the bugs. For your prohammer project I would love to see a book that merges these two books so that the new models introduced in 5th could be added to the 4th ed base.

Eldar. I started with 4th and that's the one I liked the most even as I had much more success on the table with the 6th edition book during 6th. Wave Serpents were just too good in 6th with the combination of the laser lock rule for scatter lasers and the ability to fire the serpent shield. Things I liked about the 4th ed book: warlocks embedded in guardian and wraithguard squads with purchased powers that were always just on, purchasing powers for the farseers instead of rolling on a table, avatar got a 4+ invuln, and the flavorful wraithsight rule.

Because of your prohammer project I actually tried to figure out which Eldar codex from 3rd to 7th would work best.

Ok... I'm going to leave off the specialist Marine sub-groups (BA/DA/etc.) as I've never paid all that much attention to them or :

Marines - 4th Edition, probably. I mean, I'd be mad to say the Codex: Army Lists from 2nd Ed... right? But 4th Ed gave you the most choice, even if the Rites of Battle rule that Captains had was super stupid.

Grey Knights - I liked the Daemonhunters book, but I liked it because it was a Daemonhunters book, not a "Grey Knights" book. Still, had plenty of fun fighting GKs from that book. I can't say that their first real Codex works, because that's when they got Ward'ed (Nemesis DOOOOOOOOOM Fists!) so I'll just say their 9th Edition one.

Sisters of Battle - The current one. At least they're not neglected anymore.

Adeptus Custodes - Haven't been around long enough yet.

Adeptus Mechanicus - Haven't been around long enough yet.

Imperial Guard - I love the 2nd Ed Codex, but I have to say their 3.5 book. Not flawless, but it gave you the most options and flexibility to field the army you want.

Imperial Knights - Haven't been around long enough.

Inquisition - They hardly register as a faction these days. They only ever shined during the Daemonhunter/Witch Hunter days. Those by default.

Chaos Daemons - Shouldn't be a separate Codex. They've never been good as a separate army.

Chaos Knights - See Imperial Knights.

Chaos Space Marines - Is this even a question? CSM haven't had a good Codex since the 3.5 book. The new one is certainly the best one since 3.5, but it can't hold the tiniest of candles to that work of art. Flawed, unbalanced and very crunchy, no book in the history of GW Codices has given players of a faction more choice, more freedom and more flavour to make their army into their army. The game, nay, the hobby suffers for its loss every day since.

Death Guard - 3.5 CSM Codex.

Thousand Sons - Their current one. I really like it. I'm also not so in love with the 3.5 CSM Codex to say that the 1KSons had a good list in that book. Ultimately an army with 2 wounds did not have a lot going for it.

Eldar - 3rd Ed/3rd Ed Craftworld Book/Eye of Terror Codex. The combined of these three let you play the Eldar quite well. The current one ain't bad neither.

Dark Eldar - Probably their big revision from... 4th Ed? 5th? I can't remember. They've only ever lost things since then.

Necrons - Hard to say. 3rd Ed wasn't very interesting, but it also wasn't Tomb Kings in Space. I miss Oldcron fluff, but not their unit selection.

Orks - Honestly don't know. Never paid enough attention to Ork Codices to know. They were always a "whatever" army to me. It's not the current one though, because the current one is from the No Model/No Rule era, which gives us fething dumb gak like Mega-Armoured Warbosses that have a single weapon loadout.

Tau - 3rd Ed. It was so easy to beat!

Tyranids - 2nd Ed and the 9th Ed one. 3rd Ed was abysmal, only workable with "Custom Creature" rules or the broken Seeding Swarm list, 4th Edition existed just to sell the new Carnifex kit, and everything after that was Cruddace fething them up. 9th is good (except for the boneheaded change to adaptable physiology). It's their best since the 2nd Ed book.

Genestealer Cults - These guys have been around forever, but their current form only recently. So I'll say 2nd Ed Tyranids Codex. Purestrain Genestealers in Land Raiders y'all!

3rd edition Tyranids, for the customization aspect. Seriously it was SUPER freeform but somehow managed to be relatively sane in balance (low bar I know). Honors to Warriors as an HQ choice, making a 'no characters' list possible which seems very on point and thematic. It was also back before Tyranids were locked into a handful of fixed color schemes which I dunno, seems minor but it meant a lot to me being a able to open up a spread of some 40+ wildly different color schemes with basic references on the paints used.

5th edition Daemons (I think that was the edition it came out in?). Not that it was particularly good per say, just that the subsequent ones have been so bad. 6ths randomized upgrades in particular were just anti-fun.

Chaos 2nd is also my favorite, like covers all of chaos and just so much to try out. then of course 3.5

1st didn't have codexes like we do now, but the genestealer cult army lists and lore were cool too because like the cult often would fall into chaos worship and also other factions like beastmen would join up just to stick it to the man during the cult uprising and made for some really cool modeling and painting ideas


Automatically Appended Next Post:
oh a question to the others, power level wise how does 3rd and then 4th edition generic space marines stand up to their contemporaries?

Well, this one is easy...since i went and bought most of these already for our groups collection of optional 40K codexes that i loan out on request for our 5th edition games.

* Most thematic, fluffy, lore-aligned

That is always the #1 criteria in my book

various good/fun/interesting army builds and options

This comes in a close second.


So, let's start with the emperors finest.

.space marines general-5th edition-best options
.dark angels-3.5 mini dex-still the best lore builds
.white scars-index astartes/3rd edition best lore builds
.iron hands-index astartes/3rd edition best lore builds
.black templar-4th edition-best lore builds
.space wolves-5th edition-best lore builds
.blood angels-5th edition-best lore builds.....jump infantry as troops, fast vehicles it's all very fitting. we even joked about flying dreadnoughts before this book came out.
FW has quite a few interesting chapters scattered through their big imperial armor books that run from 3rd-7th edition. including-
.blood ravens, minotaurs etc...

And while we are at it from FW-elysians 5th edition, DKOK 7th edition
.imperial guard 5th edition. the loss of the custom doctrines from the previous codex was sad but the overall army improvements make up the difference
.imperial guard armored company-3rd edition chapter approved
.demon hunters-3rd edition
.witch hunters 3rd edition both DH/WH treated the factions as they were meant to be in the lore-chamber militants of the ordo malleus and hereticus with hard counters to deal with the fantastic 3.5 chaos book. DH specifically were never intended to take the field as a full chapter as that 5th ed train wreck allowed. they were a strike force to help out any imperial faction that needed it or when an inquisitor needed the correct hammer for the job.

.eldar-4th edition-very lore based you could build every craft world force as it should have been represented
.eldar corsairs-FW 5th edition
.dark eldar 5th edition
.tau-4th edition-the codex that made tau the maneuver and shoot army, sure you can back fill some new units into the old dex but the tools they had in war gear is what made them tau
.tyranids-4th edition-the most biomorphy and interesting options.
.orks-4th edtion-hands down the most fun and interesting to play, just orky enough without being too hard to play
.necrons 5th edition-The old lore may have been better but like the guard codex the line NEEDED to be expanded beyond the same 3 army list builds. options is what you got. and good ones to boot.
.chaos-3.5 edition full stop there has never been anything close since.**
.demons-4th editon* (used in tandem with the 3.5 chaos codex for more unit options)

Then we come to the part where some armies never had a compatible edition until 7th so by default, they are the ones we own/use-
.admech/skitarii
.knights**
.GSC*
.custodes/SOS*
.deathwatch**

*These are the only codexes that myself or somebody else at the store does not actually own a copy of.
*These are owned by other or multiple other players that are not in my personal collection

I think that Grey Knights were really solid in 7th edition. The Draigo Death Star was particularly powerful and could utilize the broken psychic powers that 7th had.

Psychic powers in general were really good in 7th, and it made almost every Greyknight model valuable in some way. I had a lot of fun playing them in 7th, and everyone I played against found them to be challenging, but exciting to play against.

In a similar way, Thousand Sons in 7th were fun to play as. Having Magnus newly returned felt so cool, the whole army was awesome. But the experience of playing them was damaged since you needed to carry around 5-6 books with you to play the army…

since you needed to carry around 5-6 books with you to play the army…

I bring 16 codexes (as well as escalation & stronghold assault) with me every Saturday just in case somebody needs to use them.

Chaos. Has to be 3.5

It was the first (possibly only? I’ve not really kept up that well) Chaos Codex to give each Legion are really distinctive flavour, whilst leaving plenty of scope for Chaos Undecided. I say that as whilst you could specialise via a certain Legion, going relatively vanilla never felt like a compromise or second place option.

It’s relative power level aside (and not even all Legions were equal), it was an excellent example of what Chaos could be.

Tyranids? 2nd Edition. I know I know. Rose Tinteds are strong. But that was when Tyranids became Tyranids as we know them now. It fleshed them out, it codified their background. They were pretty nasty in the game, but that Codex nailed it.

Necrons? Their current Codex. Lots of options, and internally it’s fairly well balanced. Sure a couple of units are harder sells, but less because a unit outright stinks, and more other options are a bit better. Now I understand being the first out the gate it’s lost some ground compared to other books. But the important thing for me is any random collection of Necron units can be made into an army.

Ork codex is difficult decision, because frankly none of them were stelar.

4th/5th edition codex was good for its time, but had massive internal balance issues with units like flash gits or weird boyz being so bad that they didn't even get into "at least I have cool story to tell" territory. Those remembering the codex so fondly also probably forgot how it completely fell apart during 6th and the beginning of 7th when the lynchpins it was relying on were kicked out from under it with new core rules.
7th edition, the supplement that shall not be named and Index:Xenos2 can go die in a fire.
8th edition+PA was great because it brought the new speed freeks, kustom jobs, clan traits, Makari and other fun things, it fixed a lot of units that have been useless for years before. The bad part is the whole stratagem wombo-combo and in general low power across units, forcing everyone in spamming boyz and mek guns and not much else.
9th then took a lot of that fun away, but gave us beast snaggas and new improved Waaagh!s. FW units are a dumpster fire though, and the codex itself is horribly written.

If I had to pick a single one, 8th+PA would take the cake.
If there was the option to cherry-pick...
- start with 9th edition codex datasheets
- add Warzone:Octarius Looted Wagon, but with points
- return SAG, weird boy and blitza bommer to their 5th edition random table rules
- add 4th edition lost characters, update them to 9th's stats
- add trukkboyz and the Waaagh!/Speedwaaagh! from 9th
- add mob rule, kustom jobs and clan powers 8th
- return all wargear options from 4th

Orks there’s no competition. It’s their Rogue Trader volumes, even though everything was super crazy.

Dwelling in Tyranids for a moment as I've been looking across all their classic codexes and making some comparisons and observations. For those with more Tyranid experience, please feel free to correct me on any of the below!

* Relative to 4th edition, 5th edition (and by extension 6th edition) seems to be more costly for many units, particularly Hive Tyrants and Carnifexes.

* 5th/6th edition added the Shadows of the Warp ability to psychic-minded Tyranids, which I always thought was cool (not really an equivalent to that earlier).

* Genestealers: In 4th edition, Genestealers don't have infiltrate, which seems like a major miss, unless you take a broodlord (but you can only have 1 of those).

* 4th has a nice balance of unit customization, 3rd has the mutable genus thing which is even better. But then again, 5/6th edition have some straight up newer unit types are pretty cool (Shrike comes to mind).

* 5th was the only version that allowed for the Mycetic Spore (aka Drop Pods) for a lot of units, which was pretty cool. Which also synergizes super well with Lictors. But - one might argue about how much utility there is deep striking via a spore pod (certainly its better under ProHammer since you can charge after deepstriking, but you lose attack bonuses).

* Lictors: For some reason 5th/6th made them a "brood" as opposed to having each be it's own independent unit. Kind of runs counter to their purpose. Then again, they are a bit cheaper. But 4th ed lictors can also explicitly charge even after deep striking - which is pretty cool.

* Warriors - 4th had the flexibility to take them as Elites or HQ, but if you want to go Warrior heavy, 5th/6th has them as troops. Then again, in 5th/6th you basically have to equipment the warriors all the same, and you don't have to do that in 4th.

* 3rd/4th feel pretty limited in the Heavy Support slot. Carnifex's not being taken in a Brood limits how many of them you can take unless you sacrifice taking Zoanthropes or Biovores. This is kind of silly as the elite slot is so limited (0-1 unit of lictors or Warriors, which can also be taken as HQ). Then again, cheaper Canifex's can be taken as elites instead - so maybe it doesn't matter.

At the end of the day - it does seem like 4th edition gives a great blend of customization and potential unit diversity. While it misses out on some newer units (mostly big dumb creatures), those new units also come at a steep price it would seems. My biggest hang up with 4th is basic genestealers not having infiltration. I also loved the Shadows from the Warp ability in 6th edition (enemy psykers at -2 Ld) along with the Shrike unit.

Anyone who says anything other than 1st edition for orks is just plain wrong. It might not be their fault, they may be too young to know better, but they are still straight up wrong.

Alright, I'll bite.

Excluding factions / sub-factions that have had only one codex...

Space Marines - 7th
Black Templars - 4th
Blood Angels - 2nd
Dark Angles - 2nd
Grey Knights - 5th
Space Wolves - 5th
Adeptus Sororitas - 9th
Adeptus Custodes - 8th
Adeptus Mechanicus - 9th
Astra Militarum - 5th
Imperial Knights - 8th
Chaos Daemons - I don't know that they've ever had a good codex, but if I had to pick one... 4th.
Chaos Space Marines - 3rd (or 3.5 as most refer to it)
Eldar - 7th
Dark Eldar - 9th
Genestealer Cults - 9th
Necrons - 9th
Orks - 5th
Tau - 7th
Tyranids - 9th

This is based on my memory of how well the faction performed in the edition vs. other editions.

For me:

Dark Eldar - 3rd or 5th.

5th was a major revision and it brought a lot of welcome changes, including quite a few new units (this would also be the last time Dark Eldar would ever receive a new unit at all).

However, there were some changes made in 5th that I'm far less fond of. For one, it removed the Jetbikes and Skyboards the HQs had once enjoyed, starting a trend that would be continued in all subsequent books that the most mobile race isn't allowed mobility options outside of transports. It also removed other stuff - like the Dracon, as well as the ability for Archons to take Incubi equipment. I'll grant that it at least added some new options (which is more than any subsequent book has done), but nothing really filled the same role as what was taken away.

Added to that, I always loved the 3rd edition tagline of 'Don't let them take you alive!'. And, while this theme wasn't wholly removed in 5th, I do feel it rather fell by the wayside. Especially as far as mechanics were concerned. 3rd edition had several mechanics based around DE taking prisoners, but I believe all of these were dropped in 5th.

I'd probably lean towards 5th, but I do think it's a fairly close call.


Necrons - 3rd for fluff, 5th for everything else.

I never liked the change to the fluff made by 5th, where they went from being tragic nightmares to Tomb Kings... in SPAAAAACE! Mechanically, though, 5th definitely had the edge. Mostly because there's just more to do. Crypteks in particular were a welcome edition (even if the model was godawful), and allowed for some pseudo-customisation of squads. There was also just more options and more flexibility in general.

It was also the last time RPs felt like they were working as intended. 7th was functional but never felt right, and 8th and 9th are very messy and often don't get to work at all.

All that said, there were some mechanical changes that rubbed me the wrong way. The first being the creation of the Overlord, which has made the Necron Lord (and, to a lesser extent, the Destroyer Lord) pointless ever since. The Overlord was unnecessary and (IMO) a downgrade over the sleeker and simpler design of the Necron Lord.

Also, while I like a lot of the new mechanics, I've never been fond of the vehicles. I think having Necron pilots runs completely counter to the idea of Living Metal. Moreover, I just preferred when Necrons were almost entirely infantry-based, with the Monolith as the only exception. I'm sure others will disagree, but I'm firmly of the opinion that none of the new vehicles have improved the Necron theme.


Imperial Guard - 8th edition

I only started these guys in 6th, so I'm sure I've already missed some good books. However, 8th was the first where I felt I could play an infantry army without crippling myself.


Corsairs - 7th edition

For as flawed as 7th was, it also brought my favourite book of all time. I'd love to compare it to the 8th and 9th edition versions but alas no one at GW or FW could be arsed writing one.

 Mezmorki wrote:
Dwelling in Tyranids for a moment as I've been looking across all their classic codexes and making some comparisons and observations. For those with more Tyranid experience, please feel free to correct me on any of the below!

* Relative to 4th edition, 5th edition (and by extension 6th edition) seems to be more costly for many units, particularly Hive Tyrants and Carnifexes.

* 5th/6th edition added the Shadows of the Warp ability to psychic-minded Tyranids, which I always thought was cool (not really an equivalent to that earlier).

4th did have a Shadows in the Warp ability, although it was a passive psychic power.

* Genestealers: In 4th edition, Genestealers don't have infiltrate, which seems like a major miss, unless you take a broodlord (but you can only have 1 of those).

* 4th has a nice balance of unit customization, 3rd has the mutable genus thing which is even better. But then again, 5/6th edition have some straight up newer unit types are pretty cool (Shrike comes to mind).

* 5th was the only version that allowed for the Mycetic Spore (aka Drop Pods) for a lot of units, which was pretty cool. Which also synergizes super well with Lictors. But - one might argue about how much utility there is deep striking via a spore pod (certainly its better under ProHammer since you can charge after deepstriking, but you lose attack bonuses).

While without a codex, 7th edition added the Tyrannocyte.

* Lictors: For some reason 5th/6th made them a "brood" as opposed to having each be it's own independent unit. Kind of runs counter to their purpose. Then again, they are a bit cheaper. But 4th ed lictors can also explicitly charge even after deep striking - which is pretty cool.

* Warriors - 4th had the flexibility to take them as Elites or HQ, but if you want to go Warrior heavy, 5th/6th has them as troops. Then again, in 5th/6th you basically have to equipment the warriors all the same, and you don't have to do that in 4th.

IIRC you could give them different wargear in 6th.

CSM 3.5 edition codex is the best ever.

 Mezmorki wrote:
Dwelling in Tyranids for a moment as I've been looking across all their classic codexes and making some comparisons and observations. For those with more Tyranid experience, please feel free to correct me on any of the below!

* Relative to 4th edition, 5th edition (and by extension 6th edition) seems to be more costly for many units, particularly Hive Tyrants and Carnifexes.

Yep. It was a reaction to the "nidzilla" lists of 4th. Like how 4th made transports bad as a reaction to rhino rush in 3rd.

The whole release was a mess. The trygon/mawloc was the new kit they wanted you to buy so those were priced better in the codex. But the big hits of the codex book didn't even have models right away. The mycetic spores and tervigons would have sold very well if they had been released on time. 3rd party companies filled the gap a bit . Chapterhouse was one and the big lawsuit was filed around this time and started the move to "no model, no rules."

7th ed Tau, 100%.
The 9th ed one is a nice book but a bit limited re: CORE units.

My biggest hang up with 4th is basic genestealers not having infiltration.

Ahem....scuttling upgrade.... you need to read the codex again.

outflanking with a broodlord+12 gene stealers (with flesh hooks/frag grenades) is great fun with the 4th ed codex in our 5th ed games.