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I'm bored, and I kinda want to design something big.

So what's a missing army in 40k? It could be in game design, it could be in the lore, whatever. But I need some inspiration.

This is obviously just gonna be for fun, but hey, isn't that what the whole game is about?

An all-melee army thats all about getting into the face of your opponents army, tearing them limb-from-limb and eating them alive.
...

Admittedly, this is what I think Tyranids should be.

 JNAProductions wrote:
I'm bored, and I kinda want to design something big.

So what's a missing army in 40k? It could be in game design, it could be in the lore, whatever. But I need some inspiration.

This is obviously just gonna be for fun, but hey, isn't that what the whole game is about?

Eldar Corsairs kinda cough, alternativly really any fw index force but especially lost and the damned.

That said completly new, what about a golden age of technology Mini empire?one that survived somehow the long night.

OKorVesah wrote:
An all-melee army thats all about getting into the face of your opponents army, tearing them limb-from-limb and eating them alive.
...

Admittedly, this is what I think Tyranids should be.

Due, I play Nurgle Daemons. My army usually has one gun, on a Spoilpox Scrivener, which has 6" range at S3 AP0 D1.

Also, I'd like the army to have a decent amount of versatility. Melee only goes so far-I should know. I play Nurgle Daemons.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Eldar Corsairs kinda cough, alternativly really any fw index force but especially lost and the damned.

That said completly new, what about a golden age of technology Mini empire?

Interesting. Any ideas for what I could have? Maybe something kinda Tau-like, with their advanced tech, but with a more balanced focus?

 JNAProductions wrote:

OKorVesah wrote:
An all-melee army thats all about getting into the face of your opponents army, tearing them limb-from-limb and eating them alive.
...

Admittedly, this is what I think Tyranids should be.

Due, I play Nurgle Daemons. My army usually has one gun, on a Spoilpox Scrivener, which has 6" range at S3 AP0 D1.

Also, I'd like the army to have a decent amount of versatility. Melee only goes so far-I should know. I play Nurgle Daemons.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Eldar Corsairs kinda cough, alternativly really any fw index force but especially lost and the damned.

That said completly new, what about a golden age of technology Mini empire?

Interesting. Any ideas for what I could have? Maybe something kinda Tau-like, with their advanced tech, but with a more balanced focus?

Good question, kinda Tau like but probably more combined warfare like? As in highly mobile with spa, Spaa, airsupport, gunwise what about special issue autoguns, s4 range of 24.
With assult squads actually using assult weapons?
Field artillery (S7 ap1 D1 d6 shots?)

Average armor of 4+, probably, alot of Melta and plasma options.

T'au Auxillery, it'd make a great codex.

An undivded daemons army?

Anything to do with Malal.

I'd like to see a melee focused Technological Advanced Army. T'au already are combined arms really, a good mix of Vehicles, Suits, Infantry and Air Support is all vital to a Tau army, allowing them to be mobile and versatile. I think an army with more advanced melee technology, Personal Shields and the like (maybe a 4++ in melee), would be fun. They'd have ranged support for sure, but mainly melee focused would be really interesting, and something not currently there.

Not Online!!! wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

OKorVesah wrote:
An all-melee army thats all about getting into the face of your opponents army, tearing them limb-from-limb and eating them alive.
...

Admittedly, this is what I think Tyranids should be.

Due, I play Nurgle Daemons. My army usually has one gun, on a Spoilpox Scrivener, which has 6" range at S3 AP0 D1.

Also, I'd like the army to have a decent amount of versatility. Melee only goes so far-I should know. I play Nurgle Daemons.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Eldar Corsairs kinda cough, alternativly really any fw index force but especially lost and the damned.

That said completly new, what about a golden age of technology Mini empire?

Interesting. Any ideas for what I could have? Maybe something kinda Tau-like, with their advanced tech, but with a more balanced focus?

Good question, kinda Tau like but probably more combined warfare like? As in highly mobile with spa, Spaa, airsupport, gunwise what about special issue autoguns, s4 range of 24.
With assult squads actually using assult weapons?
Field artillery (S7 ap1 D1 d6 shots?)

Average armor of 4+, probably, alot of Melta and plasma options.

They'd probably look a little like the Forgeworld rules for corsairs or something like this recent post:

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/771601.page

I'd second Heckington's T'Au Auxillery Codex.Other options include:

* Xenos Mercenaries. Give them lots of interesting gimmicks and chapter tactic equivalents, but don't let them contribute to CP.
* Exodites. Space elves riding dinosaurs that may or may not breathe fire. I may or may not be working on this myself. >_>
* Adeptus Arbites. Judge Dredd: the army. Focus on pinning and morale mechanics. It is not enough that the foe be slain. They must be brought before the Law to have their crimes appropriately punished.
* Codex: Hrud
* Codex: Dark Mechanicus; the focus here is on highly-customizable profiles. Think looted vehicles, but with a chaos angle. What's the point of being a heretech if you can't mad scientist your own converted models?
* Codex: Witch Lords; it's what happens when someone finds a way to give decent psyker training to Jericho-style psykers and then assigns them squads of soldiers meant to protect/execute them and to work in tandem with whatever their powers are. So telepaths go on scouting missions to relay back signalless information about the enemy. Diviners tell their units to watch the skies for enemy deepstrikers. Pyrokinetisists burn the enemy up or drive them out of cover. That sort of thing.
* Codex: Gretchin

Dark mechanicum, yes not just vehicles but also your skitarri and servitors, infact screw servitors when you can have lobotomized pain immune guardsmen servo zombies lead by a posessed Mini daemonengine kinda like a Drone!

Humans, but who aren't under the heel of the god-emperor and who didn't decide to join chaos.

IE non-extremists!

Perhaps a faction where they have been developing new technology, rather than worshipping the machine spirit and continuing to use plasmaguns with a 1/3 chance of exploding!

Essentially akin to what chaos is to the imperium, but to adeptus mechanicus - they would hate each other, as one would stand in the way of progress and the other would be vandalising the machine spirit and creating godless machines.


Alternatively, some sort of malignant intelligence (like tyranids "shadow in the warp") but where it uses zombies instead of gribblies. perhaps a plague could be worked into the fluff, some sort of bio-weapon gone wrong, where even plague marines can be afflicted by it (the usual "we combined warp-stuff with a virus and now we're screwed" kinda 40k story). you can include fluff about plague marines getting cocky, thinking it is a blessing from nurgle, and then becoming slaves to the thing. Perhaps like the Flood from the Halo videogames - a sentient fungus (not orks!).



alternatively, a super-elite assassination codex, where you get to work with very few models and a lot of "it might be here!" counters. Sniper should be a proper sniper - mark a target, and then roll 2D6 - target takes this many wounds at AP-5. target is a single model (even in a unit). sniper also has many different ammo's. Basically a much more expensive vindicaire, but with more ways of not getting killed and more damage output.

also include rules for using guardsmen as bait to get a high-profile assassination done. make a requirement for an allied detachment to take the assassin, perhaps.

Missing armies:

1) Exodites - seriously how GW has gone this long without giving us dinosaurs with lasers on their heads is beyond me! They were well represented in the old Eldar lore and should make a return darn it!!

2) SQUATS! I mean do I have to mention them really?

3) Xenos faction. Tau were, I think, going to be this and I think Kroot were jsut going to be one of many xeno races added; representing the varied nature of the Tau culture and the fringes of the Galaxy. However mecha kind of took over Tau's image (which isn't a bad thing) and even Kroot have mostly been left behind.


The last is really what's missing. The only Xenos faction in 40K is really Tyranids. Eldar, Orks etc... are all fantasy races in space whilst Tau were going to get there but got distracted with big biped mecha suits of war. 40K could do with a really alien race; nothing humanoid about it just to go alongside the Tyranids who are the extragalactical race.





But yeah give us dinosaur riding Eldar!

The game is in dire need of jack of all trades army - something thats fairly durable and doesnt getblown off the table 1 due to small model count, but also does enough damage, where you make fair points trade every turn. It may not be the most killy army, but its the definition of average joes.

They could be made to look like some sort of humanoid sci fi soldiers with lot of gothic details, with giant shoulder pads and some kind of exoskeletal armor. Perhaps they can have multiple factions where each excels at a certain aspect. It should nof get boring rules like no cover saves allowed, or a blanket -1 to hit rules however.

 Sir Heckington wrote:

I'd like to see a melee focused Technological Advanced Army. T'au already are combined arms really, a good mix of Vehicles, Suits, Infantry and Air Support is all vital to a Tau army, allowing them to be mobile and versatile. I think an army with more advanced melee technology, Personal Shields and the like (maybe a 4++ in melee), would be fun. They'd have ranged support for sure, but mainly melee focused would be really interesting, and something not currently there.

We already have Terran and Zerg, so why not add the Protoss Joke aside, the idea is cool.

Tau auxiliaries would be great, and even better if the "insoupable" major xeno factions (Orks, Taus, Necrons) could all ally them in.

Oh boy! let's have some fun

Entities of the warp. There is more in the warp besides the chaos gods.

For instance codex Enslaver could be fun. An army based on controlling the others army. There is already some psychic powers in GSC and Inquisition armies that allow you to do that, but it will be interesting to see a whole army based on this concept.

Maybe some benevolent warp entity?

Also an army which can field all fliers.

It will be also nice to give more subfactions to the xeno races. In this way the game will be more balanced as now Imperium and chaos has lots of options to pick from but some xeno races are quite endogamic.

Those are some ideas for each faction:

1) For the Imperium:
I would love also to see the Lost and Dammed codex. It will no doubt try to ally them with my GK just for the lore wise lol to have a whole legion of the dammed alongside with draigo emerging from the warp altogether to deliver the emperor's wrath meanwhile foes and allies wondering what the heck is going on. good times.

Imperial agents and put there together Inquistion, assassins and rouge traders and make it a mechanic highly customizable to build detachments, even cherry pick some units from other Impreium codex up to certain power level or other restriction in order to fill detachments. It will bring the feeling to "build my own crew"

2) For Chaos:
Cypher and the Fallen deserves some love.
Codex for each of the important chaos astrates. Like for thousands sons and death guard but for other traitor chapters.

Corrupted xenos. Lore wise, chaos has corrupted other xenos races. If tyranids has things like zooanthropes and biovores then why there is no chaos Orks or Aeldari? Something like Khorne Orks worshippers could fill as well the role of a pure melee army proposed in this thread.

3) For Orks:
Expand the freebooters and space pirate ork's line.

As somebody said before greetchins codex will be awesome too. Something like the revolutionary greetchins from gorkamorka.

Ork mechs codex. With the mechanics to highly able to customize every unit, like the narrative rules for landraiders and battlewagons.

4) For Tau:
Kroots and / or vespids specific armies

Also humans inside the Tau empire. Like guardsman but armed with pulse carbines.

Air cast army. This could be and army that will be able to field only fliers.

5) For Eldars
As said before corsairs and exodites. Nothing more to say about.

6) For Tyranids
Tyranid vanguard. Something to represent the previous tyranid infilitration, besides GSC that the use to suffer a world before a core of the tyranid fleet arrives. Something like max lictors and gargoyles plus some infiltration shininess and base the whole army around infiltration.

Something like GSC but for Aeldari. How is the process to steal the genes for other xeno races? How and eldar become a zooanthrope? There is some room there to expand the lore and create a whole army around

7) For Necrons
I need to struggle more for necrons though. Maybe a codex for each dynasty?

 Overread wrote:

1) Exodites - seriously how GW has gone this long without giving us dinosaurs with lasers on their heads is beyond me! They were well represented in the old Eldar lore and should make a return darn it!!
...

I have a theory that Exodites don't have rules because of motorcycles. If you look at the 2nd edition Exodite rules, their dragon riders (think velociraptor knights) had statlines that look pretty comparable to a Shining Spear, right down to the laser lance. I think someone at GW decided that motorcycles were cooler than dinosaurs and easier to mesh with a craftworld army, so they greenlit flying motorcycle knights instead of raptor knights.

Then, because shining spears were generally considered kind of bad, overpriced, or tricky to build a list around until this edition, they never really provided a huge return on investment. So GW's been discouraged from releasing dino knights because they're still hoping people will buy up a bunch of hoverbike knights.

Perhaps a codex for specific special characters and their warhosts?

Essentially remove special characters from the generic codex and put them into their own, meaning they have to be brought in as a separate detachment.

Example:

Wazdakka with a detachment to take more bikers and koptas, everything fast, and a proviso that it cannot be taken with a spearhead formation (everything's gotta be fast!)

Orkimedes with an all-mech army, cybork boys with little quirks like bonus toughness or saves depending on a random roll at the start

Basically make themed armies to accompany the heroes, as they do seem to wander around on their own, joining random armies, rather too much.

Then your basic codex can focus on it's own synergy, and character-themed codices (or sections of codex, like a supplement) can allow you to run a themed army with some benefits but some downsides. Perhaps disallow any character themed detachments from being allied with other armies, which might help with some of the dodgy combos people can do now.

You could simply call it "Codex: Warhosts" and cover all the characters which need it.

Maybe the stryxis who would rely upon expendable slave soldiers and bio engineered monsters that die by the truckload, maybe equipped with explosives to wound enemies in melee upon death and low strength very high rend aether weapons (in fluff only void shields can stop them.) think of them as a cross between fantasy skaven (especially moulder) and haemunculi covens. and remember they hate the eldar more then Perturabo hates Dorn so factor that into special rules.

What about the Barghesi? This one Chapter is always fighting them for some reason but I don't think GW ever explains who or what the Barghesi are or why they have to be contained.

Could be a good theme to explore.

Another good one to do would be the centaur people from the first HH series book, the Interex.

I'm a little ashamed to suggest something Mariney because we have already have too many Marines around but what I find a little annoying is that Traitor Marines are all combined in one Codex when it easily could be two or more.

There are those Traitor Legions who embrace Chaos and make use of daemons and daemonic gifts and those are well represented by the current Codex heretic astartes but:

There are also those Legions who despise Chaos. Namely the Alpha Legion, Iron Warriors and Night Lords. Sadly These guys are a little shafted if you decide to play a proper fluffy force of them.

I'd love to see a proper Force of Traitor- but non-Chaos Marines. They are not represented well.

OKorVesah wrote:
An all-melee army thats all about getting into the face of your opponents army, tearing them limb-from-limb and eating them alive.
...

Admittedly, this is what I think Tyranids should be.

This is what Tyranids actually started out as...then GW went ham with tons of psychic stuff and a ton of shooting and they lost that overwhelming danger.

All the 30k Mechanicum content with models but no 8e rules?

Morkphoiz wrote:
I'm a little ashamed to suggest something Mariney because we have already have too many Marines

We don't have any proper marine codex though.

Morkphoiz wrote:
I'm a little ashamed to suggest something Mariney because we have already have too many Marines around but what I find a little annoying is that Traitor Marines are all combined in one Codex when it easily could be two or more.

There are those Traitor Legions who embrace Chaos and make use of daemons and daemonic gifts and those are well represented by the current Codex heretic astartes but:

There are also those Legions who despise Chaos. Namely the Alpha Legion, Iron Warriors and Night Lords. Sadly These guys are a little shafted if you decide to play a proper fluffy force of them.

I'd love to see a proper Force of Traitor- but non-Chaos Marines. They are not represented well.

It might be better to take a leaf out of the 30k Legion book and start re-combining Space Marines back into one central list with an appendix stuck on the end that says "if you play (Chapter Tactics (X))/Legion (X) you get these bonuses/stratagems/unique units." There are already quite a lot of books that reprint a vast number of identical profiles, not sure we need more.

Echoing some of the other posters, my vision for what the GSC codex could/should have been was a "Renegade Humans" codex: basically a catch-all for all the human forces that aren't Imperial Guard. They would have similar units, but their "chapter tactic" would unlock unique units and rules that conform to their allegiance and rules for allying their overlords in. Factions that could be included would be Genestealer Cults, Heretics, Tau sympathizers, and maybe even Pilgrims/Cults of the Imperium (unless you wanted to make it "bad guys only").

 greyknight12 wrote:
Echoing some of the other posters, my vision for what the GSC codex could/should have been was a "Renegade Humans" codex: basically a catch-all for all the human forces that aren't Imperial Guard. They would have similar units, but their "chapter tactic" would unlock unique units and rules that conform to their allegiance and rules for allying their overlords in. Factions that could be included would be Genestealer Cults, Heretics, Tau sympathizers, and maybe even Pilgrims/Cults of the Imperium (unless you wanted to make it "bad guys only").

The GSC codex is however to much irregular warfare for a catch all codex.

an army where terminators arent terrible

Rak'gol.

Giant lizardmen that replace parts of their bodies with cybernetics and use radiation laced weaponry.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Rak%27gol



Yup, thats a lizardman with a irradiated pole ax, a minigun, and a pistol for funsies.

The only missing army atm is:

Codex Rouge Trader

With all the Mercenaries and Aliens in the 41'st.

You could have all the kroot stuff, freeboota's orks, renegade space marines, corsairs, alien monstrocities, and of course Rouge traders themselves with their crews.

There would be no "chapter tactics" bonus's, but characters would all have some kind of aura buff to match the type of leader they are.

Bring in some Dark Eldar chick who takes beast and let her buff all swarms and monsters in her detachment with +2 advance and charge if they are within 12".

Rouge traders themselves would actually buff any race with re-roll failed morale and +1 to overwatch if within 6".



All Alien monstrosities would have a rule that makes them count as Enemy models towards anything that doesn't share keywords with them (so cant buff your Rak'Ghouls with psychic powers nor move within 1" of rouge trader models).


Tons of stuff you could do and throw together.

 Lance845 wrote:
Rak'gol.

Giant lizardmen that replace parts of their bodies with cybernetics and use radiation laced weaponry.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Rak%27gol



Yup, thats a lizardman with a irradiated pole ax, a minigun, and a pistol for funsies.

Okay. That sounds awesome.

Basic Rules
Broodmaster
Carver
Marauder

 Eihnlazer wrote:
The only missing army atm is:

Codex Rouge Trader

With all the Mercenaries and Aliens in the 41'st.

You could have all the kroot stuff, freeboota's orks, renegade space marines, corsairs, alien monstrocities, and of course Rouge traders themselves with their crews.

There would be no "chapter tactics" bonus's, but characters would all have some kind of aura buff to match the type of leader they are.

Bring in some Dark Eldar chick who takes beast and let her buff all swarms and monsters in her detachment with +2 advance and charge if they are within 12".

Rouge traders themselves would actually buff any race with re-roll failed morale and +1 to overwatch if within 6".



All Alien monstrosities would have a rule that makes them count as Enemy models towards anything that doesn't share keywords with them (so cant buff your Rak'Ghouls with psychic powers nor move within 1" of rouge trader models).


Tons of stuff you could do and throw together.

I didn't know facial makeup was so profitable that hiring mercenaries was necessary.

How about a Xeno faction that the 'Nids are running from, or have been hunted across the galactic divide by; hence the charred earth, constant migration of the hive fleets?