Chapter Approved Rumors - warlord traits/relics/stratagems

So, I'm pretty 'meh' about most of the leaks (which seem to be confirmed with today's post), but I think the Haemonculus (depending on wording) might actually be pretty legit with the covens trait and relic.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but "at the start of every turn" means he would heal d3 on both yours and your opponents go. That combined with 5 melee attacks and the 2 pistol shots (that also heal wounds) can create a pretty credible threat.

That being said, I am not a fan of them splicing an already small faction into thirds... I'm hoping that there will be someway they tie them all together to encourage bringing together a proper realspace raid, rather than penalizing you as they have been now.

I don't think they'll completely separate the factions, I think they'll just try to create synergy, so you can mix and match in a detachment fine, but if you run cult units with your succubus you'll get better bonuses.

Which yes means mandrakes and scourges may not get those bonuses, but they could easily balance them too.

It's pretty insane to think gw will try to split up it's most underselling main faction. They are just making it fluffy, dark eldar are a Hodge podge of cults covens and kabals, working and killing one another indiscriminately.

Well we also just learned the remaining factions to get codexes, so every army will have a codex by the end of May next year ... Maybe earlier depending on how quickly they push them out ... And then I would hazard a guess that they will be doing model releases (rules included of course) in the same sequence as the codex releases for the next couple years, or they will slow it down and do it by month and once every codex has had it's month of releases they will start over with a new addition so expect 9th edition to be teased at sometime in 2020 -2021 ...

bleh, just a webway portal strategem is lame as frak, I mean I'm glad it works on beasts and such but the army could use more

I'm not concerned about GW trying to create three completely separate sub-factions for us.

I'm concerned about GW attempting to make three sub-factions that are suppose to work in tandem with one another and inadvertently creating more dysfunction within the army.

Contrary to GW stating Chapter Approved will help bring the non-codexed armies in line with the codexed ones, I think we can anticipate a very small amount of 'new' items for our army, and what we do get will be underwhelming. Given that the "rumored" warlord traits were structured in the same manner as what GW alluded to today, I have no reason to believe they aren't correct...which is deeply disappointing as well.

I think it's a safe bet that we aren't going to see an index army on the top tables regardless. However, assuming the rumors and the information from today is correct, I'd bet on each faction getting 3 Stradegems.

TheBaconPope wrote:

I think it's a safe bet that we aren't going to see an index army on the top tables regardless. However, assuming the rumors and the information from today is correct, I'd bet on each faction getting 3 Stradegems.

1) Good point, you're right, we're not going to see an index army running the table until it is no longer an index army

2) I would be OK with 3 different stratagems assuming they're fantastic...but otherwise my concern still stands for imbalance/lack of cohesion.

TheBaconPope wrote:

I think it's a safe bet that we aren't going to see an index army on the top tables regardless. However, assuming the rumors and the information from today is correct, I'd bet on each faction getting 3 Stradegems.

I have the nagging suspicion that since we're getting '3 unique warlord trait' we're going to get less stratagems/relics or whatever than the other indexes...

If the leaked warlord traits for wych cults is true maybe lelith could become useful? Send her to murder infantry through numbers of dice even with her low strength. Give her or a succubus the +1 WS combat drug and after turn 3 you will count hits of 4+ as 3 hits with the warlord trait. Lelith gets 5 attacks with her blades and 2 with her hair. Though I suppose that could work just as well with just a succubus with an agoniser. Then take an archon or haemonculus as a 2nd character to give the pistol relic to as the succubus would swap their pistol for the agoniser.

Edit: Also Ynnrari was left out, things don't look too good for them currently. Maybe it means they are getting a codex soon since they were left out?

My other army is Tyranids, so i guess i'll just stick to them and their 20something stratagems and such until our full Codex hits.
And avoid this, seemingly half baked, cashgrab...

Marrath wrote:

My other army is Tyranids, so i guess i'll just stick to them and their 20something stratagems and such until our full Codex hits.
And avoid this, seemingly half baked, cashgrab...

It costs me $32 to buy a new ink cartridge for my printer. I am seriously considering doing that and printing out the 30 or so pages of the Eldar codex that I need to play them properly rather than give GW money for their flavorless, uninspired, copyright-sanitized book filled with reused artwork and flavor text, totally forgettable in terms of hobby value that they have the audacity to charge $40 for.

I was hoping Chapter Approved would not be the same thing but it appears not everyone can have the same fun and style the Tyranids get. If only Forge World was in charge of writing all the codexes, they may be slow but I'll be doggoned if their indexes don't have more fun and flavorful rules than half the codexes out now.

TeenageAngst wrote:

Marrath wrote:

My other army is Tyranids, so i guess i'll just stick to them and their 20something stratagems and such until our full Codex hits.
And avoid this, seemingly half baked, cashgrab...

If only Forge World was in charge of writing all the codexes, they may be slow but I'll be doggoned if their indexes don't have more fun and flavorful rules than half the codexes out now.

I will have to disagree with you there. The Forge World indexes felt ridiculously rushed to me. The Forge World indexes felt somehow even more rushed than the normal ones.

For chapter approved I am pretty hopeful that it will make lots of point costs changes to balance many of the over the top units.

Oh they were rushed no doubt but that doesn't take away from the fact that everything in there felt like 40k and not like the same 3 rules copy and pasted. Like the Tantalus and Reaper have actual, interesting rules.

Mppqlmd wrote:

They'll probably give us the strict minimum, otherwise they'd feel like it might reduce the hyper for the codices to come.

I think GW giving us more than just a single new warlord trait shows that it could be a long wait for our actual codex. There are a few xenos factions that need more help than us. Necrons have seemingly gone back to sleep and I have barely seen Tau played since 8th came out.

What I'm really looking forward to is a points reduction that seems eminent. It would follow the trend of current codex and help bridge the gap between our forces from the index to forces with full fledged codex.

I'm hoping to put my reaver jetbikes and grotesques back on the board. I'll be waiting to see if they do anything to the Talos or Cronos as well.

TheBaconPope wrote:

I think it's a safe bet that we aren't going to see an index army on the top tables regardless.

I would also think that it's a pretty safe bet that the tournament meta will get shaken up quite a bit when Chapter Approved gets released. Consider everything we know about what's coming, I'm not sure that one can say that index armies will never see the top tables:

• Points changes for all armies - this (hopefully) means index armies will see points reductions in line with what we've seen for units in the codexes. It also means that any units in codexes that have been deemed to be unbalanced in the other direction could see points increases as well. Potentially there could be points changes for FW units as well.
  
• Changes to the matched play rules - these could affect whether or not certain "meta" units are worth spamming/bringing any more, or even if certain builds will even be legal any more.
  
• Mission changes. I know that the London GT is planning on holding off releasing their mission pack until after Chapter Approved is released. From the hints they gave earlier this week, it looks like building a balanced army may be better overall over the course of all five missions in a GT than a crazy alpha strike army for example.
  
• WL traits, strategems and relics. I won't disagree that the "leaked" items in this regard seem underwhelming compared to what some codex armies get, but in combination with all of the above I would argue that new builds will become viable and DE and other index armies may very well have a decent chance at winning GTs.
  

The latest article doesn't give any specific points updates apart from Malefic Lords increasing to 80. A change to targeting characters was hinted at. FW units are getting repointed, I wonder if they will change points for the Tantalus and Reaper. The only DE affiliated unit mentioned was that the Harlequin Death Jester will decrease in points (shown in an image, not the text), but not by how much.

hekatrixxy wrote:

The latest article doesn't give any specific points updates apart from Malefic Lords increasing to 80. A change to targeting characters was hinted at. FW units are getting repointed, I wonder if they will change points for the Tantalus and Reaper. The only DE affiliated unit mentioned was that the Harlequin Death Jester will decrease in points (shown in an image, not the text), but not by how much.

I suspect that the change to character targeting will be something to the effect of 'you can't target a character if there is a closer non-character unit in LOS', as players lining up several characters to force their opponent to only be able to target the closest one is a currently a bit of an issue. Dedicated bodyguard characters already have an aura effect for guarding; you shouldn't be able to turn every character into a personal bodyguard.

That's quite an increase on the Malefic Lord. 30 to 80? Ooof. Not that it isn't deserved...

One other issue with targeting characters is that if there is a closer visible enemy unit that is locked in combat, then you can't shoot at the character, so hopefully that will get fixed too.

I'm concerned it's to do with using Los blocking terrain to snipe characters

hekatrixxy wrote:

One other issue with targeting characters is that if there is a closer visible enemy unit that is locked in combat, then you can't shoot at the character, so hopefully that will get fixed too.

That's not a real issue. As in, players aren't really using that as a regular tactic to keep their characters safe.

Besides, the point is that closer stuff is supposed to distract you from targeting individual characters. Do you really think that your opponent should be able to fire through a massive chaotic close combat to hit your character that is standing back behind it? Because that's what you're asking for.

Vathek wrote:

I'm concerned it's to do with using Los blocking terrain to snipe characters

Why wouldn't that be valid? If the character is the only thing that you can see, then it's fair game. If you've got your models set up so that you've got LOS blocking terrain preventing your opponent from seeing your character screen, then that is your tactical error, and not the fault of the rules.

It might be that characters need to be within so many inches of friendly models to benefit from the protection. It makes no sense for a character completely on its own to be obscured by a unit closer to the shooter, but in the opposite direction.

TheBaconPope wrote:

Quote :

In no way is balanced a synonym for boring.
And when factions become too unique and individual, you soon end up with an unplayable mess.

In another sense, I'm left to wonder why about a third of strategems and doctrines are just copy pasted from another book.

because there are no longer universal special rules so a bunch of them and a bunch of rules that were similar across a bunch of dexes got smashed into stratagems

Im pretty hyped for this at the moment, means I can run my big blobs of troops and drop them in.

Should be pts reductions in some good places, I am most keen to see pts drops for Disintegrator Ravagers / Razorwings, Mandrakes and a buff of some sort to characters.

Most armies in the local META here are Chaos LOW Spam, Guard Infantry / Tanks and Eldar Dark Reapers. DE have the tools to deal with all of that, Haemo's could do with a pts drop as well.

Should be good, at least as a stop gap before the Codex comes out.