With 9th edition slowly coming to a close as the last books get released into the wild, let’s unpack this edition and see what we liked and didn’t like.
Starting in 2020 when 9th edition dropped we’ve gone through some highs and lows in this hobby. Some things worked and some things didn’t. If anything this edition feels like the overall plan was good but the execution was uhm…let’s just say it left a lot to be desired. Granted, I am a newer player. I’ve started playing in 8th edition and it’s been a wild ride seeing how this edition unfolded for my experience. I didn’t know about blast templates, anything for 6th edition or whatever older players of this game enjoy – so this is a fresh slate of what I personally enjoyed in 9th edition coming from a newer player.
There’s A LOT to talk about here so I’m going to break this article up into 3 separate pieces of focus – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. As much as I know how fun it is to bitch and complain about something, first let’s start with The GOOD parts of 9th edition.
The Good
Grand Tournament
This is a double edge sword. On one hand it’s great to have set rules for the tournament scene, on the other this made fun casual games a lot harder to come by since this was really the only option we had for Match Play. Maelstrom was one of my favorite ways to play this game casually and it was gone (recently brought back with Tempest of War that you can get in the FLG store) for a majority of 9th edition.
However, GW looking at the tournament scene and actually taking pages out of FLG’s playbook for rules is an amazing addition to this game. Seeing how secondaries were tweaked throughout the edition has been great and god do I already miss the days of Stranglehold.
FAQ’s, Errata’s and Data Slates
Games Workshop really stepped up here and made some great changes in the way they balanced the game. Although I do still wish that this information was more easily accessible (news flash GW the hyperlink for the FAQ page for United States is still broken), and I wish the documents had better clarity if it’s going to be constantly updated. I barely even knew what changed in the most recent FAQ and that’s BAD.
However, the fact that they’re even doing this is overall a good thing. There were definitely some kneejerk reactions though that could have been dialed back. I still pour one out each game for my Orks and Custodes brethren.
Armor of Contempt as an update was powerful (almost a bit too powerful) and really helped out armies that needed it. Still, if I’m shooting a Battle Sister Squad with an AP3 weapon they shouldn’t be saving on 4’s like they have storm shields for less than half the cost.
Necrons getting Core (how is the Silent King still core????), was also a huge bonus for the army. I think that we can all agree that these changes, although good – need better refinement.
Crusade
This is probably one of, if not the best addition to 9th…although some combinations for this game mode can be pretty ridiculously overpowered. However, for a narrative game Crusade is absolutely amazing to play especially for newer players. Being able to construct your army throughout multiple sessions and really build up your characters is so much fun. If you haven’t played this yet, you need to get on it before something happens and it’s completely removed.
The Plastic
We’ve gotten some gorgeous plastic when it comes to 40k to where they can be considered C Tier Age of Sigmar models, but S Tier models when it comes to 40k. Be’lakor is not only a gorgeous model, it’s also super generous for new painters since there’s so much detail in it making dry brushing super easy. Every new model that GW has put out this edition has been absolutely fantastic.
The new Black Templar models, League’s of Votann, the Abominant, the list goes on with some awesome plastic that GW is providing us with. Keep ’em coming because as we all know, editions can change and fluctuate but painting and hobbying stays forever, unless you don’t varnish.
You can read the next article on “The Bad” parts of 9th edition in the article here.
Welp, that’s enough of my rambling. We still have some more to talk about so check in next time when we go over THE BAD parts of 9th edition. What were things that you enjoyed about 9th?
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