Weekly General Q&A Thread: March 03, 2021

You can't "exchange" it at all. In Crusade, units have Relics permanently, and it cannot be chsnged. The only way you can even kinda do what you are asking is dropping the unit from your order of Battle, and then adding the same datasheet back: however this would cause the unit to effectively lose all XP, Battle Honors, and other upgrades you have on it; effectively you are "resetting" the unit.

Min/maxing your Order of Battle between games doesn't work well in Crusade; you actually need to plan your upgrades.

Once a model has been given a relic it cannot be removed or changed.

As per the Order of Battle rules; Once you have added a unit you cannot change any of its details. This means that you cannot change the number of models in that unit, the wargear they are equipped with, or any of the abilities, Warlord Traits, Relics, psychic powers etc. you have chosen for that unit.

The relic requisition confirms this further; This upgrade is permanent to this unit, and cannot be removed or changed.

Grimdark painting is a style of painting where everything is dirty, grimey, colours are generally washed out and not vibrant, there's lots of wear and paint chipping etc.

As long as you yourself are fine down there painting, that shouldn't be an issue. The issues will happen if your paints actually freeze.

If you want to read the Horus Heresy go for it. It's a ton of books though. Maybe read the Siege of Terra books if you don't feel like reading 54 books. They take place near the end of the Horus Heresy and there will "only" be 8 books

If you’re looking for the books about the current setting then the new series Dawn of Fire will give you a great place to start. If you’re looking for broader looks at the setting, but not the up-to-date period, then Ciaphas Cain, Gaunts Ghosts and the Eisenhorn books are commonly recommended.

Check out the Warhammer Horror line. No baggage, just self-contained storylines from all different corners of the grimdank future (and the Mortal Realms).

Correct, unless they Fall Back. However that unit will be able to fight you.

Unfortunately, current evidence suggests no.

Neither of the previous partworks, Conquest or Mortal Realms have been made available in the US, so it's likely that this one won't be either.

Detachments are nothing more than a structure in which to organise your units to form a "legal" army. You are not obligated to take any particular detachments, nor a certain amount of detachments. Neither is more important than the other, nor does one have to lead the other.

The closest you get to a "leader" is electing one model to be your warlord, this works the same regardless of how many detachments you have. You'll probably notice that Patrols, battalions and brigades have the command benefit which allows them to refund their CP cost if the warlord is within them - this encourages players to take more rounded and balanced armies rather than flood the board with only one unit type. For this reason most players start off with at least one of these detachments, but you don't have to.

Your codex will give you a number of benefits if all of the units in a detachment are part of the same faction. Typically you'll get bonus traits and abilities (which generally includes granting all troops objective secured), as well access to their stratagems.

The supreme command detachment is unique to certain powerful models - namely primarchs, deamon primachs and supreme commanders - of which most factions don't have.

No. Incursion just refers to the total points/power level of all the units in your army.
You do not need another detachment to "command" them. Just run both detachments and pay the CP cost to field a second one.
You only get 1 warlord though.

Supreme Command Detachments are essentially a CP tax on certain very powerful units to prevent you from building your list in a way that GW thinks is unbalanced.

if you're in the UK, there's a case to be made to subscribe to Imperium Magazine to build your army

Otherwise, there's various marine Combat Patrol boxes that represent a decent cost saving. Space Wolves is not the best (since one of the units, reivers is just never used at the moment) but dark angels is pretty decent (blood angels is better raw value but you may not run the vehicle as often as a dread). just swap or ebay the DA transfers and upgrade sprue.

Yep, use any matte black. I personally use Rustoleum Camouflage Black; It's like something on the order of $4 a can and covers great.

be wary of car auto sprays - some of them are gap filling. Great for fixing scratches, terrible for miniatures.

Do not get automotive sprays.

Do you mind posting what was in the lot? Not personally a CSM player so I dont know how helpful I can be but I can try to assemble at least a 500 pt list.

Yes, they are full multipart kits.

There are plenty of videos on youtuve that show how to do detailed areas, especially of space marines, so I'm gonna answer the "hidden" question.

99% of the time when you see a really great paintjob, you aren't seeing the hundreds to thousands of hours that painter has spent getting to the point where muscle memory and fine motor control are on point, or the small little habits they will have that prevent losing control.

Additionally, the tools you use can make a major impact on how well you can do. If you have a $3 brush that doesn't come to a precise point/splays out as soon as it touches something, you're gonna have a different experience than someone who has a $12 brush that is great for details and doesn't splay.

If there is a specific marine chapter you are trying to paint as, I suggest looking it up on youtube, with the Warhammer TV channel being one.that specializes in more "newbie friendly" techniques, while other channels like Xereus Minis, Epic Duck, and Darren Latham going at more detailed examples.

Base paints usually have denser pigmentation, which means they will cover what is underneath in less coats.

Depending on what you are doing, it might not matter, but if you primed your models black, for example, it might take 7-10 coats to get a solid color if you are using a layer paint, rather than 2-3 coats of a base paint.

Layer paints have worse coverage, you will have to put more coats to cover what's underneath.

Not really, but layer paints are thinner so don't cover as well. As uch you'll need to use more coats of a layer paint to get a solid base colour.

No, the Nightbringer's ability is very specific about the rules it affects; "cannot use any rules to ignore the wounds it loses". This relates to 'feel no pain' abilities that state something along the lines of; "Each time this model loses a wound, roll a D6; on a roll of X, the model does not lose that wound.

To further clarify, the core rules state that "A model loses one wound for each point of damage it suffers". As such you do not lose a wound until a point of damage is assigned, and in the case of Abaddon the amount of damage is halved, then he will lose the appropriate number of wounds - only at this point would the Drain Life ability come into effect.

There is no established rule, and is left to each play group how to handle it, and might even be handled on a case-by-case basis.

As an example, I play Deathwatch and every one of my Fortis Kill Teams became illegal as in our 9th edition supplement we can't mix Intercessors and Gravis models anymore. As well, certain relics I was using now work in a completely different fashion

My group gave me the option of being able to "rebuild/swap the unit composition/relics of those units without cost of an RP, as it wasnt my fault that the units are now illegal/work in a completely different fashion.

Meanwhile, a Necron player literally had nothing change besides some PL.

Literally, there is no one-size-fits-all answer, and your group will need to decide on what you all agree is fair in the circumstances

Only if you have a rule that says you do, like Space Marines' Shock Assault rule.

Despite most transports having the "Dedicated Transport" role, the previous edition's rules that a DT was purchased for a specific unit no longer exists and hasn't for over two editions. You could fill a drop pod with 10 different units if you wanted to. Also, note that a Character is still a unit.

Not sure what you mean by this, but there are no universal rules for "challenges" in the core rulebook, so I'm assuming you're talking about a mechanic from the previous editon.

I would suggest reading the free online core rulebook for 40k, as that would cover most of your questions, and to be frank many rules might have names similar to old rules that you used to know, but actually function completely differently now, such as Look Out, Sir.

I mean, you should be aware of the rules? A bit hard to say what you would need to be aware of when it's hard to tell if you're a visual leaner and need to watch youtube overviews if the rules to understand, or if you're fully capable of just reading them and getting them.

Army recommendations, likewise, kinda need to know what you're looking for from a game..

Mostly sunny so far, chance of rain in the afternoon.

Miniatures for a dollhouse are probably your best bet, i'm no expert in their scales though so you'll obviously want to make sure of the sizes. Probably tons of dollhouse tea-sets available, a teddy might be trickier to find but there's bound to be one somewhere. Plenty of sellers on marketplaces like ebay and etsy for this sort of stuff.

Another option is to find accessories for small toys. I've no idea what stuff is around for kids these days but i'm pretty sure polly pocket is still going and accessories for that and other similar toys will be absolutely tiny. There's a tiny teddy in this set for instance.

Of course, you can always sculpt something with green stuff.

Welcome to the hobby, all the rest of us hate that sort of thing too. Your best bet is to use BattleScribe (an army building app) that more or less contains point costs and detailed rules for all models.

Imagine, if you will, that instead of having a single codex for Necrons, you have a "General" Necrons Codex, and THEN on top of THAT, if you want to play a specific Dynasty, you'd need to get a Necron Dynasty Supplement, which might be $30 for just a single Dynasty specific datasheet and a few rules.

Congratulations, that's what Space Marines Players are expected to do (Space Marines Codex only has "general" units, all the Chapter-specific units and rules are each in their own Supplement).

Now, in FAIRNESS, the info sheets that come with the units have had issues, as if GW changes how the abilities work/the rules for that unit, they then need to re-package the unit, plus then all the units already in circulation past their hands suddenly have out-of-date rules that people get angry about when they buy from a third-party store rather than GW, and the new simplified datasheet means that instead of spending 12 pages of writing the rules in 12 different languages for a unit, they can just print a single page with picture icons and it works worldwide.

However, yes, many people are dissatisfied with the way Games Workshop handles their rules via physical Codex releases; the fact that they are so reliant on them means that we have situations like we have currently where Chaos marines are down a wound vs their Loyalist counterparts for no real reason other than the fact that they are keeping that update with the CSM codex so people have a reason to buy it.

And having obtained the 7th, 8th, and 9th edition Deathwatch codices, I'm also unimpressed by how much of the information in the books is effectively recycled; not just the artwork, but also the lore, stories, and other aspects of the book.

That being said, there is unfortunately a shockingly large portion of the hobby that gets SUPER PISSED at the idea of Games Workshop going to an all-digital rules system that is used like *checks* every single other major wargame like Warmachine/Hordes, Infinity, etc. I honestly don't get it, but there are people who will rant and rave how they ton't want to have anything besides physical books. And that's not MENTIONING the people who get pissed off that they couldn't buy their Limited Edition version that will be out of date just as fast as a regular version, but costs 3x as much.

To a point, I get the codex release structure, as PART of the reason they cordon off updates to each faction is to make sure there is foot traffic into 3rd party stores that make the majority of their sales, which they do by guaranteeing they have a new product release (pre-covid) every week.

But yes, the Codex system they use for rules is exploitative, and more and more we are seeing people simply refusing to purchase them as there are other viable ways of getting the rules.

/

In GENERAL, yes, Battlescribe is accurate with what wargear a unit can take, though it CAN sometimes have mistakes; however, since most people who spot mistakes will send bug reports to the data authors, there typically aren't GLARING issues unless the faction isn't heavily played (and therefore mistakes will persist longer). It would help if you mentioned which kit you're referring to.

But many kits, especially non-Primaris Space Marines kits, have many more weapons options than are on the sprues that the unit comes with, due to GW's previous policy of just allowing most wargear willy-nilly and expecting people to buy multiple kits/upgrade packs in order to convert the units (a policy that kinda got a damper put on it due to the legal issues brought up in GW PLC vs Chapterhouse Games)

Games Workshop, since the lawsuit, has TRENDED towards units only being able to equip what comes in the box for them, however there are a vast majority of older players who have equipped their models with previously-legal wargear options not in the box, and they basically have to do a balancing act of "don't piss off the old-timers by making all their models invalid" and "move towards having our models be more standard with what just comes in the box".

The simplest beginner friendly explanation is: that army doesn't exist anymore, and it's really a waste of time to try to play it as the vast majority of people you are likely to play will consider it an illegal army. Quite honestly, you're better off playing them as regular Imperial Guard that just have "wink wink nudge nudge" chaos Iconography on their tanks for some odd reason (I.e. cosmetically are H&R, but on the table are played as standard Guard)

Explanation:

Games Workshop has, in recent years, launched a "Legends" program, which means some they will still peovide rules for specific units, however Legends units are not recommended for Organized Play. Essentially, it's a program of "we're gonna give these things rules so people don't complain that the units 'dont exist' anymore, but we're not including them in balance passes."

For the most part, nearly all of Legends datasheets are units that either havent had models that GW sells, or, like the vast majority of the Renegades and Heretics datasheets, have NEVER had an official model.

Additionally, while GW only discourages Legends datasheets from organized play/tournaments, the VAST majority of the player base takes this as a de-facto ban list, as the units don't get points updates and will only be considered for FAQ once per edition, if even that often. So, unless you confirm with anyone you are playing beforehand that they are okay with Legends, you can expect people to not play you because your army might be considered "banned" by your local player group.

On top of all of THAT, even if you WERE to use Renegades and Heretics rules, even the rules they had in 8th edition was basically "Guardsmen without any of Regimental rules, orders, Stratagems, or units that make Astra Militarum good". Literally, playing Renegades and Heretics is basically "I'm playing Astra Militarum without any special rules, sacrificing 1/3 of my units to do it."

They USED to be good in 8th as a way to gain command points for the REST of a Chaos army, but how that Command Points isn't tied to how many TROOP units you can throw into your army, Renegades and Heretics are actually DETRIMENTAL to Chaos armies as it COSTS command points to add them to a Chaos army.

Orks haven't been in a starter set since 5th Edition ended in 2012.

The current starter sets are Marines vs Necrons because Necrons are the poster boy bad guys for 9th Edition.

During 8th Edition it was Death Guard, 6th and 7th both had regular Chaos Space Marines.

As Necron minis are included in all the current starter sets, the market is flooded with cheap, new on sprue options so badly painted minis are going to be very hard to shift.

if I use a god emperor model

There are no models of the Emperor. Which model do you mean exactly?

It's technically possible as you've found, but not really ideal.

Get yourself a toolkit for gundam modellers from Amazon like this one. The clippers and proper knife will give much better results.

Realistically, making two armies of double-Indomitus would heavily favor the Space Marine side, as having two units of Eradicators and outriders will vastly outperform the extra benefits of the double units for Necrons; in addition to that, the Necron HQs will be much more redundant than on the Space Marine side, while the Marine side can easily cover the ENTIRE army with the Tempormortis ability.

If you use the boxes to get access to more non-HQs fairly cheaply and sell of the extra HQs you will have or whatever, yeah, sure it will be a decent purchase, but running the whole box contents twice leads to some very, very lopsided games.

a lot of the characters will be duplicative and not used in a 2000 point game (especially some of the Necron ones that aren't all the best).

You could start games with what you've got, and then expand into other Necron/Marine options based on what feel like the army is missing or just units you guys think look cool. Having numerous different units will offer more varied play style.

The thing you don't seem to realize is Kill Team is a completely different skirmish game, that doesn't share the rules of mainline 40k: it's a separate game in the same universe that just happens to be able to use 40k miniatures.

So for nearly $200, you get 12 models, and a bunch of scatter terrain that is only good for a SEPARATE game than 40k

For the price you pay, you can get MANY more models that are more useful to an army

Skip it. It's not a starter set and a bad deal.

We don't have any release dates for codices beyond the Drukhari one at the end of the month, unfortunately. If you're just playing beerhammer and your group is cool with it, it shouldn't be an issue to scrounge the rules from online. But if you're playing pickup games against people you might not necessarily know, or in tournaments, then you should definitely have the codex on hand to answer any questions that might come up.

You don't have any unit that would need chapter master rerolls, Master of Ambush is rather redundant with Swift and Deadly on the same character and missile launcher is meh. Also you don't have any relic.

I'd drop the chapter master upgrade and use the points to add another BGV model and change tacticals to Intercessors with grenade launcher and power fist. Then for the Captain I'd use an offensive trait like Imperium's Sword instead of Swift and Deadly and maybe Armour Indomitus for the relic, though Burning Blade would also be a good choice to get that S8 on the charge.

many metallic paints are really thick, but realistically can't be thinned much without the shiny bits separating from the rest of the paint.

You can thin with water, but you shouldn't thin more than 3 drops paint + 1 drop water, it gets a bit iffy beyond that.

Personally, I switched to Vallejo Metal Color paints, which are airbrush-ready so they're already thin enough for brush work. Plus they're way more shiny than citadel paints (and the old vallejo metallics)

Yes, you need to thin them.

Water works just fine with all GW paints.

I prefer using Lahmian Medium to thin GW metallics. Water causes them to separate too much for IMHO.

But as another user pointed out, I also try to use Vallejo Metal Color line of metalics whenever possible. They are great right out of the bottle. Use them for both brushwork and airbrush.

Many. I suggest going through the citadel paint app to see them all.

Why no shades? Carroburg Crimson shade is fantastic, useable for a ton of stuff.

Not Citadel, but I use Vallejo Heavy Violet and Royal Purple for my Soul Drinkers

If you mean their Crusade Requisitions, you have access to both the Space Marine Requisitions and the DA Supplement Requisitions.

Due to how Crusade works, technically ALL IMPERIUM players have access to all Requisitions of any IMPERIUM faction.

Access to Stratagems is based on a per-game basis, depending on what Detachments you have.