A high level discussion on changing the DH codex

[Venerable Rhadamanthus]

Unfortunately I'm going to have to agree with what others have said and say that one of the big fluffy points of the Inquisition is requisitioning other armies to work for them when the situation warrants it. Not only will this make GW a little more money by encouraging players to buy from different armies and maybe one day expand what was meant to be an allied portion of their armies into a full-blown force, but more importantly having the allies rules, in return for the tedious FAQ process about it, gives the army a near-limitless flexibility. You can requisition Space Marines for their elitism and tactical flexibility (and gives a good excuse to have Jump Pack marines in a Grey Knights army :lol:) or Imperial Guard for sheer manpower for a gunline or their tanks for some heavier firepower and would go a long way towards helping Grey Knights with their anti-tank weakness.

 

 

I'm of mixed feeling about getting rid of the abilities vs Daemons. I'd be more inclined to streamline, edit, adjust, trim down than just nix them completely. Otherwise it takes away from the flavor of the army. It is called Codex:Daemonhunters for a reason. As there are things Daemonic in C:CM and C:CD as well as few other daemonic tidbits out there (Avatars, etc)...I think the abilities are justified.

 

As for the Allies, I'm for getting rid of it, though I can be persuaded to revise it. The problems I have with it is people misread/misuse it. For example...see Ominous's post above. There is a flaw in it. (sorry, not singling you out maliciously..just illustrating a point Om!!) He states: "You can requisition Space Marines for their elitism and tactical flexibility (and gives a good excuse to have Jump Pack marines in a Grey Knights army"

 

Unfortunately this is wrong.

 

pg 30 states: The following units may be used in a Daemonhunters army to represent units which have been temporarily put under the command of an Inquisitor Lord or GK Hero. ... These units may not be chosen as any of the compulsory choices in an army, and Allied Space marine units may NOT be used if any GK's are present in the army."

 

Thus negating using Jump Pack Marines in a GK army!!

 

Now you CAN have a GK unit as an ally for any Space Marine Army...so you can have a squad of GKT's and a squad of PAGK's as part of your C:SM army, but not SM's as allies for your GK army! (as per pg 21)

 

It gets confusing and misread and often misunderstood!

 

Also, as to fluff...

 

as Inq D posted: "This I can't agree with to be honest. One major section of our fluff and storyline is that an =][= has the authority to drag whatever poor souls into the daemon's den as he sees fit."

 

or Ominous posted above: "one of the big fluffy points of the Inquisition is requisitioning other armies to work for them when the situation warrants it. "

 

That is not entirely correct! The Inquisition can conscript IG, etc all they want no problem. The Inq has to ASK for SM help. The SM chapters are outside Inq and Ecclesiastical authority (most don't recognize the Emperor as a God) and DON'T have to obey! (stated many times in fluff and codex's) They usually say yes because it fits their own goals, they have a good relationship with the Inq (not all chapters do), or they don't wanna make waves, whatever. Many times Chapters have said no or left in the middle of an Inq hunt. (DA anyone!)

 

Even the C:DH codex states on pg 21: "In theory at least, an Inq has the authority to requisition any Imperial materials or forces they consider necessary..." and "Likewise many Marine Chapters have long standing oaths or are honour-debts with individual Inq's or the Ordo Malleus itself, whose help can be requested if circumstances merit it." (operative term "requested")

 

 

I do favor the idea of IG type units etc being part of the codex as to allow for more flexibility, variety, etc. And perhaps some generic SM units as well...requisitioned by an Inq if the player doesn't want to use expensive GK's, but wants good SM equivalents...

 

(the C:DH codex states on pg 21: when using Allied or Inducted troops, only the basic versions of these troop types can be used. No variants of any kind.... Designer note: ...use Steel legion as normal IG...or varient SM to stand in for normal SM...would NOT use Chapter-specific rules." )

 

So how does that work with the new C:SM and the special characters?!?! They are Chapter specific, yet it says in the C:SM you can use them to represent characters from your own Chapter so... and you couldn't used special DA, BT, BA,SW rules so....

 

 

 

It seriously needs to be trimmed and simplified.

[Grand Master Tyrak]

That is not entirely correct! The Inquisition can conscript IG, etc all they want no problem. The Inq has to ASK for SM help. The SM chapters are outside Inq and Ecclesiastical authority (most don't recognize the Emperor as a God) and DON'T have to obey! (stated many times in fluff and codex's)

 

Theoretical and irrelevant, I'm afraid. An Inquisitor will not ask for SM help unless he genuinely needs it, in which case the Chapter will agree to help. The chances of there being a situation where help is asked for and refused are minimal at best. Even if a junior Inquisitor tried to 'pull rank' for his own gains, the Inquisition would shoot him before the SMs got a chance to say no.

 

So how does that work with the new C:SM and the special characters?!?! They are Chapter specific, yet it says in the C:SM you can use them to represent characters from your own Chapter so... and you couldn't used special DA, BT, BA,SW rules so....

 

Simple, don't put them in the DH codex. Just put in Tactical Squads, Scout Squads, Assault Squads and Devastator Squads. Maybe some Land Speeders or something too.

[Captain Malachi]

(the C:DH codex states on pg 21: when using Allied or Inducted troops, only the basic versions of these troop types can be used. No variants of any kind.... Designer note: ...use Steel legion as normal IG...or varient SM to stand in for normal SM...would NOT use Chapter-specific rules." )

 

So how does that work with the new C:SM and the special characters?!?! They are Chapter specific, yet it says in the C:SM you can use them to represent characters from your own Chapter so... and you couldn't used special DA, BT, BA,SW rules so....

You can't take them as allies anyway..........But yeah it does need streamlining a bit.

 

As for the whole GK with jump pack marines issue, as it stands you can take up to two full units of PAGK, a unit of GK termies, a GK hero with his own termies, and a third unit of GKs teleporting in your SM army. That's basically a whole GK army at most reasonable points levels, and you can then take your obligatory two units of tactical marines, a captain and an assault squad. For all intents and purposes you have a GK army with jump pack marines in it.

[Ominous Anonymous]

It seriously needs to be trimmed and simplified.

 

For the record, my Jump Pack comment was just poking fun at the then-reviving discussion on FA choices in the Fixing Daemonhunters thread. :)

 

You made some good points though, but as Tyrak and other have pointed out the end result in game terms should be to allow Space Marines as allies for any number of reasons (Honor debt, happen to arrive on the planet or even the same battlefield at the same time). You are right about there being some oddities about who can take what when and how. Would it be better just to say that a Daemonhunters army can either field X HQs X Troops and so on from an Imperial Guard/Sisters of Battle/Space Marine army into theirs and vice versa? I'm against putting generic SM units in the Daemonhunters codex because it doesn't encourage you to play a distinctly Inquisitorial army if you want, while the Allies rule encourages you to expand afterwards. Not to mention it'd be weird having units in a codex they don't really belong to and don't have to outside of a redone Allies rule.

[Venerable Rhadamanthus]

Good points all.

 

I only commented on the "fluff" stating that they had the "authority" to have SM join them. All I was clarifying is that they can "ask" for help and "usually, but not always" the SM Chapter will say yes. "Like all Space Marines, they do not consider themselves subject to Imperial rule..." (quote from BT codex) So it was more of a semantics issue with how Inq forces get SM allies. Just to clean up the rationalization for keeping allies.

 

As I stated before...I am open to the idea of revising it (or hoping GW does at some point ;) ) ...it does give the Codex some uniqueness (above what it has already).

 

Sorry Om..wasn't aware you were poking at the "fixing.." thread. lol

 

And Capt. Malachai helps me illustrate a problem I have with the current Allies idea perfectly!! I knew there was something bugging me, but I couldn't remember...I don't use the Allies...

 

He states: "As for the whole GK with jump pack marines issue, as it stands you can take up to two full units of PAGK, a unit of GK termies, a GK hero with his own termies, and a third unit of GKs teleprinter in your SM army. That's basically a whole GK army at most reasonable points levels, and you can then take your obligatory two units of tactical marines, a captain and an assault squad. For all intents and purposes you have a GK army with jump pack marines in it."

 

Now I'm not saying he or anyone else does this, but I see this as a prime example of the potential for abuse of the intent of the Codex and Allies rule. The rules right now are written poorly enough to allow abuses to the intent of the Allies rules. I think this caters to the idea of a distinctly non-Inq army!

 

With the advent of Apocalypse...people can mix armies willy nilly all they want! Great! And they even included a basic Allies Matrix for people should they want to use it. As I tend to prefer Apoc games myself, I think that's great! I'm just not sure that it's needed in the Codex anymore..or in small games or Tourney level games...but that's just me.

 

As fluff tends to favor Inq requisitioning IG type units more easily and readily than asking a SM Chapter for help..I like the idea of having IG type units in the Codex. Upon thinking it over and reading what Om said about putting SM units in...I agree with not putting them in the Codex, but still being able to use them as Allies in some fashion. What fashion that may be...? Such as Om said about making it specific..allowing X number of Y units etc....

[Dragons]

Such as Om said about making it specific..allowing X number of Y units etc....

 

That only works in the CURRENT edition.. What happens with 6th Ed. or 7th Ed. and the 3 new updates to the SM Codex that may not have Y units any more and even if they do they are not in X numbers any more.

 

We are currently playing with a 3rd edition Codex in a 5th edition world. Somple allies rules that point to FOC and # of points would be my preferance over specifice unit entries as THOSE won't get outdated.

 

-Dragons