Hello, wargamers. FLG has graciously allowed Captain Morgan back into their word harbor to drop off another batch of thoughts and opinions on 10th Edition 40K.
As some of you may remember, I’m a massive Blood Angels fan. So, it likely comes as no surprise to anyone that I found great joy in the news that the Blood Angels managed to pull off some impressive competitive wins at recent events like the Rocky Mountain Open. Thankfully, It is far from being the only event where the Angels have pulled off an unexpected triumph after spending the majority of the edition on the bottom of the 40K win rate rankings. A massive thumbs up to all of those dedicated players who stayed the course and played hard to get those wins.
That being said, I have some unfortunate predictions for how likely this trend is going to continue, and it is not just about Blood Angels – it is about most if not all of 40K’s factions coming up for release in 10th edition.
The Demise of Death Company
The Death Company plastic kit that came out back in 5th edition has gotten a lot of mileage since then. Highly regarded as one of the best marine kits to kitbash with (perhaps only losing out in terms of versatility to the Space Wolves kit), the Death Company also have the wonderful benefit of being one of the most useful and iconic tools in the Blood Angels arsenal. Just the theme of black with red crosses has been enough to generate extra animosity from my opponents. Only naming my least favorite Stormraven Gunship after my ex-wife saved my Death Company-themed Stormraven from getting extra attention from my opponents back in 7th and 8th editions.
Unfortunately, I fear that this legendary kit’s days are numbered. How can I tell? Crisis suits.
The recent release of the Tau Codex made a core design philosophy of 10th edition 40K very apparent. When a unit’s points cost remains the same no matter what wargear you choose, players will only choose the absolute best loadout for that gear. GW’s answer to this problem is to take the extremely customizable kit and split it into several different datasheets that have defined roles and (most importantly) can be costed specifically for specific loadouts. Do you see where I’m going with this?
Auspex Tactics (the legend) does a great breakdown of several of the recent Blood Angels lists that are doing well. While not all of them make use of the Death Company with Jump Packs datasheet, most of them do. In each instance, when Death Company are present, they are using a Power Fist/Inferno Pistol combo on each marine. After all, why not? It’s way more effective than and costs the exact same as marines with chainswords and bolt pistols, after all. Kitbash or 3D print a bunch of fists and pistols and you can do the same!
But for how long?
Evergreen Modeling
I’ve been collecting Blood Angels for close to 30 years. Veterans of GW’s red-armored stepchildren have been through this cycle before, and it’s not unique to us either. A certain build gets good, people scramble to put it together in time for the next few events, kits and bits sell out and get scarce, and then POOF! The build is no longer viable. This happens in almost every edition. How many people do you know spent a lot of time and effort building Vanguard Veterans with Storm Shields and Thunder Hammers in 9th edition? The answer is a lot, and not all of them wore red armor either.
For me, this is why I take an evergreen modeling approach. My hobby time is scant and precious (and getting more so). I was all-in and gung-ho about the Leagues of Votann release, but I never had an army ready in time to play it before 10th Edition started. In fact, the codex didn’t even arrive at my doorstep before it had been changed and its points/builds were no longer accurate (a grief for another article altogether).
This reinforced a lesson that I learned about how to build an army. If you have the time and money to hop around and chase builds, more power to you, but I prefer to make my modeling Evergreen. What does that mean? It means building a unit in a way that will likely be usable for many editions with minimal changes required.
This saves me from having a lot of models like Vanguard Vets that never get to see the table in their future defunct or illegal builds (though that still doesn’t save some units from falling into obscurity). It’s also why I’m not spending a lot of time or money trying to build 20+ Death Company with Power Fists and Inferno pistols. It’s why many of the Tau players who had/have crisis suits magnetized the weapon loadouts because Cyclic Ion Blaster spam was never going to be Evergreen.
The New Problem
Evergreen modeling may have been useful for the last couple of decades, but I suspect that it is not going to work so well going forward, and most particularly for Space Marine-based collectors. I’m fortunate that I built my Blood Angels in a theme around the Horus Heresy-era armor marks. That means that I have about 60+ jump-pack marines who can still get time on the table in the Horus Heresy game, though I still have about 20-30 marines in the mark 8/9 armor who will likely have to wait for some kind of 40K Old World release. My Death Company with Jum Packs are likely going to die out, however.
The unveiling of Death Company Intercessors has to be one of the flattest releases that I’ve ever seen. From day 1 of their release, they have been overshadowed by how much better looking, better performing, and more thematic their Principia brothers with Jump Packs have been. Now with Assault Intercessors with Jump Packs (I swear that GW’s new naming conventions are bloating my word count), I suspect that we are an overpriced upgrade kit away from losing access to the firstborn Death Company kit for good.
As much as I applaud our recent Blood Angel champions for their listbuilding and gameplay prowess, I can’t help but feel bad for the amount of effort that is now going into copying their lists in the wider community. In a few short months, we’ll see Death Company kits go out of stock and power fist/inferno pistols begin to overperform at events large and small. By the time the Codex comes out, I predict that all of these Death Company will be unusable. Either the datasheet will put bit-in-kit-based restrictions on loadouts, or they will be replaced completely by (deep breath) Death Company Assault Intercessors with Jump Packs. That’s my prediction for Blood Angels, but it is likely in the future for a lot of the as-of-yet unreleased factions for 10th edition.
To be clear, I’m not saying to not pursue the most effective combos and wargear combinations for your armies for competitive play. I could hardly stop you from doing that if I wanted to. Just make sure you are thinking about how much time you won’t have to get value out of the investment of pursuing builds that won’t stay good for long. If you are like me and your hobby time is scant and precious, then perhaps focusing instead on things you know will last will keep you from feeling like you fell victim to a GW cash grab by chasing the meta. If you aren’t sure you can finish the project in time to get enough games in to justify the time, cost, and effort of making the current “best” loadout for a datasheet, maybe just wait until the codex is out before you start ripping the arms off your models.
As for the rest of 40K, I suspect that DA, BA, and Tau players are just the beginning of the compartmentalized changes that are coming for playstyles and datasheet builds that players are accustomed to.
Which factions and units do you think will be the most vulnerable to this going forward? Let me know in the comments!
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