Well, that answers that! Games Workshop has given us formations for both Sisters of Silence and the Adeptus Custodes. Thanks for taking swift action, GW!
Follow the link to see the new formations!
Well, that answers that! Games Workshop has given us formations for both Sisters of Silence and the Adeptus Custodes. Thanks for taking swift action, GW!
Follow the link to see the new formations!
Holy duck, swift answer from GW? Its truly an age of miracles we live in.
Right?! A Beautiful new age!
And those formation bonuses are actually nice, especially the one Sisters have. -2 dice is pretty significant and can prevent 1 major spell per turn from manifesting. I like it.
Yeah, that is REALLY powerful, haha.
Why stop there? Double up on the formation and reduce their pool by 6!
It would be -4
Yeah, misread that the first 6 times I read it, usual GW, crystal clear rules writing, haha.
Why stop there? You can get two of these formations in, giving the enemy -6 dice and littering the table with models that turn off psychic powers.
Now just be sure to borrow some drop pods before ITC starts using the new FAQs. 😛
I like that it hampers psychic deathstars, but it also worries me because it really hurts people who are using psykers in a reasonable way too.
Then again, they aren’t that hard to kill. I guess it does have a much bigger impact on deathstars because they can’t just rush in blindly, they have to pick off the sisters with their other units first.
Armies that are using psykers in a reasonable way will be more balanced and not as desperate to get in close with their psykers as soon as possible, so they won’t mind having to pick off the sisters first.
Well… Time to convert 15 girls =)
Hell, I’d go with 30! haha, 3×10
Man these detachment bonuses are awesome.
I don’t know how to equip the Custodes now.
The Sisters are a phenomenal unit.
Question: As per new FAQ they can’t deploy in an allied transport, but they can still enter one on the first turn, correct?
Correct. As long as the transport is battle brother of course.
For events that are using the FAQ, yes. Most ITC events do not.
Well, there we go, then! I was expecting something to allow them in battle forged lists, but I wasn’t expecting it this soon! Good on you, GW! Now we can just get back to playing with toy soldiers and rolling dice!
New GW is freakin’ amazing!
Agreed!
Wow, great job GW
So with Genestealer Cults stealing all the candy from Eldar and now the Sisters of Silence stealing the warp-dust from deathstars I think we need a new meta. That should make for interesting times.
Yeah, the meta is definitely going to shift, that is for certain.
See? Told ya all we had to do was wait. =P
I may or may not have written an article on that very topic two days ago =P
Perfect….I knew if we waited, it would be sorted out =).
Now….can we please get on to ratifiying the GW FAQ? As it stands, we’re going to have Sisters of Silence riding around in BB drop-pods. That needs to not be a thing.
Their low point cost makes them way too good if they can use drop pods.
…not to mention riding around in a rhino projecting their aura.
Yeap, we need to adopt the GW FAQ.
Well at least the sister’s rules explicitly state that their aura doesn’t work in transports. Almost as if they know a certain tournament group doesn’t currently use their FAQ.
Lol, fair observation. But, they are probably just making it consistent with the FAQ.
They will be able to ride in Rhinos regardless, the GW FAQ simply prohibits you from starting the game in them, IIRC.
The best thing in the comments is a guy saying ‘fluff says no’ and gw respond with ‘fluff says this’ and a link to beast arises. I’m buying gw shares.
Right?1 lolol, the fluff is a tool to enhance the play experience, not a straight jacket for game design and business decisions.
For a player like me the fluff enhances the gaming experience substantially. I think it is part of the release process.
– Fluff
– Models
– Rules
3 legs to a stool that go together, and they typically go in that Order. I think GW was always going to release the Rules for these models (complete rules including detachments), but they were going to do so in conjunction with some near-term fluff to justify them. It’s interesting to see them change up the order a bit.
I’ve always called those three factors the holy triumvirate of a good miniatures game. I agree, those three aspects are critical for success in this hobby. Typically, GW has ranked them similar to your ranking but with Models above fluff and rules third (IMO). It is interesting to see this new presentation with rules higher up. If you think about it, though, it’s easier to adjust rules in the short term. Easier than either fluff (as it has so much impact on everything else) and models which take time to develop. Rules are the most fluid of the the three legs and therefore, the easiest to adjust on the fly. I think it makes sense to have an agile rules system and is better for the game in general terms.
I’m really happy that GW released rules for these units including detachments to use them in 40K. I wish they had released fluff 1st, but I’m sure it is in the pipe.
However, next time we start considering making up rules for the ITC, we need to take a deep breath and ask ourselves where our priorities should be. Focusing in the top tables lists, and the popular meta choices might not always be for the best. By definition, average players don’t play at the top tables, and yet they are the ones who support our tournaments. They are the ones that become disenfranchised, and they are the ones who need our focus.
I’ve faced 7 Ork lists at my last 8 events. 4 of those Ork players had illegal lists. 3 of those lists were illegal because of relics taken from the Waaaagh Ghazgul book. Those relics are currently limited to formations taken from that book. Making up a detachment for Ork players to legally use those relics would be a major qualitative improvement for these Ork players who all won at least 1/3 of their games at those events, it would improve the quality of the events, and it would improve the meta.
Another easy target would be Shadows in the Warp. It doesn’t work right. It doesn’t match fluff. It wouldn’t be hard to make a functional version (Psychic tests only pass on 6’s when the psyker is in Shadows). It would drastically improve the meta (much, much more than the inclusion of Custodes or SoS).
Another easy target would be the Astra Militarum Decurion (Cadian Battle Group). The Core choices are so massive an unwieldy that it just doesn’t work at 1850. It could be tackled in a few ways, the easiest of which would be making the Emperor’s Blade Assault Company a Core choice. It is both cheaper than the existing core choices, and the closest formation they have to something like a Battle Company (3 Units of Vets, and 1 CCS in Chimeras or Tauroxes, and 1 Hellhound variant). .
One last easy, easy rules tweak that would drastically improve the meta is to fix the Ork Decurion (The Great WAAAGH-Band). Lots of ways to do this, but 3 are exceptionally easy. #1 Get rid of “Da Boss iz Watchin”. That rule is essentially a mob rule penalty to Orks that makes it much, much harder to use mob rule to pass failed leadership tests.
Or #2 allow Ork Players to use Ghazgul in place of a warboss as part of the Great WAAAAGH-Band.
Or #3 allow Bully Boyz to be a Core choice in the detachment.
All of these things would have a much more positive impact on the meta for the average tournament player than adding Custodes or SoS or whatever else GW comes up with that they aren’t ready to introduce full rules for yet. It was heartbreaking to see the rush to make up rules for these units from the same people who feel no rush at all to improve the meta in other more significant ways.
Now that the immediate crisis has passed, it might be time to really assess the priority of the ITC, and how a few minor little tweaks could drastically improve the meta, but in ways that wouldn’t impact the top tables much at all.
I like all of you suggestions and agree. If I had a magic wand I’d make all of them a reality right now. But we’ve found that these fine tunings work like, 50% of the time (rough number, please don’t take that to the bank). It really comes down to if the overall community also perceives these changes to be positive enough to earn their vote.
Reecius,
Please, please consider the advantages of getting rid of the Battle Brothers rule in the allies matrix. This would go a long way to getting rid of deathstars in the game and the wacky rules interactions that people take advantage of. Also, only allowing a unit to benefit from 1 blessing at a time would be great as well.
Definitely I think Battle Brothers and Stacking blessing have received enough requests to make them part of the vote.
I hear where you are coming from (and agree) but I feel that that has a snowball’s chance in hell of passing a vote. Too many people have armies built around BBs.
If you are right then there is no risk at all to you adding it to the next update poll. It is a free, and easy way to shut us up.
i thought people were paragons of integrity and honor and dont vote for their own advantage over the good of the game as a whole.
lucky for us people dont vote for their own benefit and will vote for whats best for the game as a whole right?
The only way we can make sure they never happen is to never vote on them, right? Maybe it is time to open up the vote a bit more?
I mean we voted on Corsair Jetbikes moving after overwatch twice, but can be bothered to vote on Shadows in the Warp? How does that make any sense?
You’re approaching this from the perspective of what makes sense to you as an individual. The ITC can’t vote on every game balance issue or it would be a thousand question poll. We look at what the community brings to our attention with the most frequency. No one is talking about changing Shadows in the Warp to us right now but you. I agree with the points you made about some of the formations that really struggle right now, but unless a lot of people are talking to us about it, it doesn’t go on the poll. Otherwise, to be fair, every time anyone brought up a perceived rules imbalance we’d have to address it, it would be too unwieldy of a system.
1) So you are saying that people have asked about corsair jetbikes twice as much as Fixing Shadows? Because I don’t believe that for a second.
2) I’m not approaching this as an individual. I do just fine. I’ve been to more than 25 Tournaments including 9 GT or Majors, and helped run 11 of them including a major.
I know you’ve been to loads as well this year. The difference between you and I is how we approach events. I immediately seek out the players using lists that aren’t standard meta lists. I talk up the Blood Angels player with 6 Dreadnoughts, and the Sisters player, and the Skitarrii players that isn’t using War Convocation. I seek out the Militarum Tempestus, and the Tyranids, and the Astra Militarum.
None of these ideas are my own. I’m not that smart. All of them come from marginal players who are in a stage of burnout because the feel like the competitive meta no longer has a place for their chosen army. These are the ideas that I hear again and again, or when suggested find universal agreement.
Most importantly, because I’ve come to understand more, and more about the ITC, these are the absolutely easiest possible ideas to implement. Very little work for you, just add them to a poll, and if it passes add them to the FAQ. I can even write the poll questions for you.
3) It is convenient that the slippery slope argument comes up every time there is discussion to tweak rules for a lesser represented faction. I didn’t hear the slippery slope argument from you at all during the SoS / Custodes conversation. In fact, you made impassioned defenses against it. In a recent signals episode “We’ve made exception after exception after exception….” The problem is the exceptions are made for the top tables. They aren’t made for the average players. The players on the margin are ignored because they aren’t as vocal, or as present in your circle of friends.
4) I’m the only person talking to you about fixing shadows “right now”? Could be. Shadows has been broken since the start of 7th edition. Here is a bet though. I’ll buy you a drink next time I see you if I’m wrong. I’ll bet you’ve heard 3 times as many request to fix shadows since the start of 7th as you heard to add SoS or Custodes to the game. Tell me I’m wrong.
More importantly, is Squall a Custodes? They all wield Gunblades!
I’m impressed and pleased with how quickly GW has responded. Like others, I’m guessing they already had these formations (and maybe others?) in the pipe but got them out quickly to forestall the torches and pitch forks.
What I’m not impressed with is the artwork for the SoS imbedded within the article above. Yikes! The concept is solid but the result . . . oof. Fortunately, other renditions of SoS have been much better.