Cptn. Heinrich von Strahm

[Giga]

The idea is to represent Steel Slayers (my DIY chapter) through their own chapter tactics. They're a short-to-long-range shooty chapter, hence the improvement to bolters, as the chapter's philosophy is to maul the enemy from extreme range before going in and mowing them down with bolters. They view close combat as impractical and overly risky and therefore best left to specialists (which is why the 10 suits of TDA the chapter has are used almost exclusively by the chapter's most distinguished close-combat fighters).

 

Heinrich von Strahm is the 2nd company captain, and the likely 1st company captain and maybe even chapter master someday. He takes it upon himself to lead from the front and by doing so keep the morale up at all times. He is armed with one of the chapter's few relic blades, and is renowned for his ability to return unscathed from the worst of devastations.

 

 

 

2nd Company Captain Heinrich von Strahm - 200 points

 

WS:6 BS:5 S:4 T:4 I:5 W:3 A:3 Ld:10

 

Wargear: Artificer Armor, Relic Blade, Storm Shield

 

Special Rules: And They Shall Know No Fear, Combat Tactics, Eternal Warrior

 

Chapter Tactics: If you include Heinrich von Strahm then all units in your army lose the Combat Tactics special rule. Instead, all boltguns in your army count as twin-linked. This only applies to Tactical, Command, Honor Guard, Devastator, and Sternguard squads. If more then one character in your army has the Chapter Tactics special rule, you must choose which version will apply.

 

Heinrich von Strahm is a captain. He unlocks a command squad.

[Chengar Qordath]

He seems a little bland for a special character; aside from having Chapter Tactics, there is really nothing to distinguish him from a standard captain. Add another special rule and/or a piece of unique wargear; something to make him stand out a bit more. As a thought, how about something like a unique storm shield that has a bolt weapon of some sort built into it? It is a touch odd to have a chapter master whose tactics are all about bolt weapons, but who has no bolt weapon himself.

 

Also, the chapter tactic needs a bit of clarification; does it work with combi-weapons as well as normal bolters? Does Sternguard special ammunition have any effect? On a related note, it probably would not cause too much an additional balance issue if bolt pistols and/or storm bolters were included in the chapter tactics (IMO, special ammo bolters being twin-linked is much more powerful than either of those). You might even be able to extend that to heavy bolters, thought that might be pushing things a bit.

[Giga]

My initial idea was to give his relic blade a unique name, and maybe make it master-crafted, but I avoided this to keep the rules simple and because the chapter as a whole possesses only like five relic blades, as they aren't too fixated on close combat.

 

The way I see it, the chapter tactics will also work for sternguard special ammo and the bolter part of combiweapons. The chapter tactics deliberately do not work for bolt pistols and storm bolters, because they're the sort of guys who like their rapid fire, and seldom use their assault guns. The idea is to make a flavor rule that would also go a long way toward making tacticals the rapid fire killers they're supposed to be.

 

I had an idea for a special rule that basically allows him to pick one model in base contact and allocate all his attacks against that particular model. This would allow him to kill powerfist sergeants, special weapons, etc. However, I'm not sure if this rule would be overpowered AND annoying.

 

Another special rule idea I've been toying with is allowing him to give a bonus to reserves as long as he's alive, to show his tactical acumen and all.

 

Was also thinking about giving him a boltgun with hellfire ammo, just for flavor purposes.

[Oiad]

Never bother with traditional point calculations with special characters, even if most here will swear by it. You should be getting more for your 200pts of SM character. Example - Switching the 'standard RB' for a 'special TH', Lysanader has all this plus extra rules and an extra wound, yet costs the same price. The only things you do better are striking at Initiative and sweeping advances. I'd rather just take a 'counts as' version of Lysander instead.

[Giga]

Yepp, I agree. The way I saw it, having eternal warrior + TL-ed bolters in the entire army + command squad access would be worth 40 points (even with the loss of combat tactics). But now that I think of it, he could either be improved by being given things like master-crafted relic blade and digital weapons + maybe even another special rule (such as the +1 to reserve rolls rule that would be so nice to my playstyle), or I could lower his price to something like 180 or 185 pts.

 

The idea is to keep his rules very reasonable or maybe even slightly underpowered, just in case someone ever agrees to play against that sort of homegrown rules. :)