Monday, March 3, 2014

Warhammer 40K Codex: Imperial Knights

I have noticed an interesting twist in the war between those like me who want to play JUST the main rule book and my codex..  and those who want to play everything there is to play to so called "forge a narrative".

Don't you love marketing?

The twist is this:  they are reversing gears and actually issuing what we would have called a supplement before as a CODEX!  So for those like me who said "Hey, it aint in a codex or Iyanden/Farsight/Black Legion type codex supplement I'm not playing it" GW intelligently responded by calling the Imperial Knights CODEX:  Imperial Knights.

Didn't see that coming.  But I should have.  I will accept games against it now since it is a Codex, but the fact that it has a D weapon and that they actually broke the invisible line that always existed between (for example) the 4E rulebook and the trial assault rules of Chapter Approved (remember how fun those were?) is now fact.  Now the line is gone forever and with it also the veil between D weapons and the normal 40K games.  And with that broken, the justification of other things is provided.

Remember that moment right before you decided to dance with the devil for the first time?  Placed your first bet, drank your first draught?  Weren't sure if you should, knew things would never be the same afterwards?  Yeah, well.  Here we are.

I'm curious to hear what people think about this.  Because Codex:  Fill in the Blanks is coming and they will be different moving forward.  Mark my words, the Imperial Guard codex may well contain Void Shielded fortifications as core (and don't fortifications just make sense in an IG narrative?).  Might even...yes...see the iconic Baneblade in there so GW can make its point.

Thoughts?

10 comments:

  1. I doubt we will see the Baneblade and its variants in the Guard Codex for the simple reason that it is a lot of page space and they already covered it twice between Apocalypse and Escalation.
    I'm in the camp to allow only as much as they force me to by putting it in a Codex. So, right now, we have super heavies and close combat D-weapons are okay.This also means I am cool with Lords of War that fall into this requirement, hence no ranged D weapon = all good. But honestly I feel like I have bent about as far as can go; if they include ranged D in a Codex that will be a turning point... ranged D is really bad for the game.

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  2. Ranged D weapons is a bad idea. Apocalyptic explosions, while "cool" cinematically also are uh... well lets just say Apocalypse hasn't been a version of the game that very many people here like. Lol. Do we ever see it? On rare occasion. But its usually set up way in advance, usually at someones house and usually ends about how you'd expect so almost no one even knows the game happened outside the people who played it. Ive seen the same Apocalypse books up on the shelf for quite a while along with the paraphernalia of it just sitting there.

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  3. I do share the feelings that this "CODEX: whatever" is indeed some kind of marketing/make them play what you want kind of thing.

    I too don't really care for D weapons in "normal" 40k, and do agree that this may be an attempt to blur that line.

    As a person who does play a lot of apoc, and a few games of escalation here and there, my biggest beef is not D weapons unto themselves, but their un-even access to them.

    Some factions can get easy D weapon on very good platforms (revenant) while others either have terrible ones (tau tigershark) or none (tyranids).

    Honestly, unless they are changing the STOMP rules however, I think people may discover that the D weapon is the least of their worries (if they have changed it for this unit, then I am ignorant to that fact). How are orks and nids supposed to kill something with stomp + CC D weapon?

    Regardless of if this latest "CODEX: Buy This" is balanced or not, is it really any worse than screamerstar, eldar spam or whatever?

    Dunno....

    Thanks for the post, like reading your blog.

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  4. Well the Codex: Imperial Knights is actually not going to be super unbalanced unto itself. It will win some games in spectacular fashion but the thing is, its going to lose them that way also. 6 Hull Points doesn't stop you from exploding on the first hit. =)

    The reality is this particular codex isn't going to be "broken" though it will be a mismatch against those unprepared for it and like Scramer star etc... they wont STAY unprepared for it forever. But the blurring effect this has is an INTENTIONAL thing and especially as they prep 7th Edition, they want their options OPEN as to what they can put into it. So this Codex allows that. Its a strategic move by the "Narrative" crowd running the show. On its own the Codex: IMperial knights will do little more than add some REAL bad ass models to the table 9and they DO look good) but on the macro scale, it does a lot more than that.

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  5. Apperently from talking with a few people about the imperial knights that you do not roll on the peniteration chart till the last hull point, so I don't see it exploding like a normal armored vechile. Again I've only heard from alot of people this an have not read the book yet myself, so I could be wrong but that might change the outlook people have for them

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  6. Yeah. Big time. Seems unlikely but I

    Uppose anything goes now!

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  7. So I see a lot of talk about "the narrative crowd" on forums, I guess I see it differently. I see it as the "Money Grubbing Crowd." With previous edition changes yeah I had to readjust some stuff here and there but 6th edition caused me to completely reformat my armies. Where I have units that I have been using for almost 15 years some of the units are being shelved because the new rules changed he game. It forced people to buy more or get out. Each new codex is he same way, making you either buy more models or get out of he game. It started with some of the last codex's to come out of 5th ed. requiring people to reorder lists to counter the new gimmicks. They hide it in the "forging the narrative" set of rules but the real reason is to get us to buy more.

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  8. Do you think they are pushing narrative because that's ALSO how they prefer playing in the UK/other parts or do you think its strictly 100% money. I personally hold no grudge towards companies selling new products. I just would hate it to be their only concern, given the games history and its competitors success should be of concern.

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  9. I obviously cannot comment for the entirety of the UK but in the south west of the UK (Bristol area) the major tournaments all restrict current rules in order to have a more balanced play style this includes reducing all battle brother to allies of convenience to prevent certain star shenanigans, no special characters in allied detachments etc etc. I would say the distrust of GW's motivations are universal and I find that whenever I go into a GW store they push what is newest regardless of what I play (Night lords and Dark Eldar).

    As an aside, your blog is awesome and I am glad you now post on Dark City as well :)

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  10. Ah hello there! Well tell a few people about the blog and maybe we'll turn it into a party. =) Feel free to scroll back through and see if other past posts look of interest to you.

    As for the Southwest of of the UK, i found that interesting that the heartland of GK so to speak is as mistrustful as we across the pond. I am interested ni several ideas for tourney rules to restrict the overall power curve without hurting player choice unduly. My driving motivation here is the newest player. I beleive this hobby must be ABOUT that newest player, making it easy for them to get engrossed because rules or no rules, these freaking models kick SO much arse. They NEED to be played with. They WANT you to push them around! They're practically begging you. and when GW is on the brink, and someone very interested in our opinions buys them (I'm thinking Warren Buffet should buy it and donate the company to gamers everywhere so we can make a Space marine statue with his cybernetically enhanced and cryogenically frozen head kept at GW World so that when the technology to restore his Gene seed comes along, we will have no problms thanking him. =)

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