Oh it gets bad, it gets real bad this edition. There’s some points of this game that don’t make sense and there’s some that do, but these are my least favorite parts of 9th edition.
Last time we went over some of The Good side to 9th edition (you can read the article here), but as I wrote out that article it became apparent that…there really isn’t that much good stuff that came out of 9th edition. Granted there were great steps in the right direction, but the execution of these steps left a lot to be desired not just by me, but by a large amount of the community for 40k.
I could talk about this for hours but let’s just go over a couple that really bugs me.
THE BAD
Codex Creep
Oof. Honestly, I didn’t think it was going to be as bad as it turned out to be in this edition and I think a majority of that comes down to Covid and shipping problems. Regardless, this was an awful part of this edition. We’re about to move into the 3rd year of 9th and Astra Militarum still hasn’t received a codex yet. It’s supposed to be coming at the end of the month, but really how long are they going to have before 10th edition rears it’s head? This isn’t even codex creep at this point, this is just really sad for Astra Militarum players who’ve been slapped around for 2+ years and maybe get’s to play with their new book for a handful of months.
Necrons having to wait until now to get their codex in line from when it first dropped in 2020, rules that newer armies have that older armies don’t, higher strength weapons compared to older codexes in the edition, the list really goes on and on.
I know a lot of people say, “This is the best release schedule we’ve had.” Cool, that doesn’t make it good. As a newer player, seeing the codex creep get so out of control is not very pleasing.
Rules Bloat
I thought the whole point of 9th edition was to get rid of rules bloat??? Not only do I have to flip through a handful of pages just to find out exactly what “Let the Galaxy Burn” does. Why do units have 20 different keywords that I have to look at different pages to find? Why do I need to have 4 different books to play an army?
I remember when Crusher Stampede came out for Tyranids and so I had to purchase the White Dwarf magazine to play my army before their new book dropped. To play a non 9th edition army I needed to use my 8th edition codex, a white dwarf magazine, leviathan octarius or w/e the f*ck that book was that had leviathan rules in it (spoiler alert, I haven’t looked at that book since the 9th edition codex) and on top of that I also needed to be on top of any FAQ’s for the army.
Although I welcome the Data Slates and FAQ’s, what I don’t enjoy is finding everything. It’s such a nuisance since they’re scattered everywhere and I swear to god every event that I go to I have to explain Fight First, Fight Last and Fight Normal at least once. The rules are so scattered and all over the place with constant changes it makes it so then you have to live and breath 40k to stay on top of it which is not something most people can or want to do. At that point you’re competing with other things people would like to do with their spare time besides reading rules.
Kneejerk Reactions
This was incredibly off putting to me with this edition. Orks getting their buggy change was a huge slap in the face for Ork players that just received some new models and new ways to play with their army only for it to get smacked down into oblivion to where they don’t even use those models anymore. That’s the worse part about it.
Models that you love, new toys that you want to play with, old ones that you can finally put back on the table, just kind of beaten down into nothing. Harlequins, finally I could run voidweavers that we absolutely trash and garbage for as long as I played I can finally run them now – oh wait they’re now nerfed into oblivion. Now I’m back to running the same type of list I was running in 8th…but with less stratagems and now consolidated into the Eldar book…cool.
Custodes…bro. I am so sorry for you guys.
Army Specific Secondaries
Before you go and talk about how awesome it is for armies to have secondaries, let me take a second and say that I agree with you. The problem is that the execution of these army specific secondaries was awful. Herd The Prey, Stubborn Defiance, Purifying Ritual and Oaths of Moment when they came out with their respective books were such powerful secondaries that other armies had major trouble keeping up with. With universal secondaries becoming harder or having less options (this honestly doesn’t make sense to me), your army really lives or dies on whether or not you have good secondary choices. Army specific secondaries become stronger and books without access to higher tier secondaries are going to become lackluster unless the army is just so ridiculously strong it doesn’t matter.
I enjoyed the universal secondaries more because it put everyone on the same playing field. Army specific secondaries feels bad when you go up against someone that has an easy 15pt. scoring secondary (or even worse 2) that’s specific to their army. Meanwhile you’re picking 2 from the grand tournament and looking for a 3rd “kill” secondary that you might only score 10 or 12 on.
Well that’s all for today, tune in tomorrow for the exciting finale of what the ugly is of 9th edition. I know it’s not over and it could get worse, or hell even better, but humor me as I spill out all this pent up sadness about a game that brings me so much joy.
Like I said in the precursor, there’s definitely more that can go to into this list, but we can be here all day just like in the last article about The Good of 9th edition.
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