Admech combined book

[TempestBlade]

Anyone hear any information about the joint skitarii / cult mech book? I heard before that it was the beginning of summer then pushed back until FW released some admech stuff (which the new shield guys are awesome looking ). It is nice to work on other projects (Deathwatch!) but I would like to use some Kastelans!!

[JeffTibbetts]

I doubt the FW models have anything to do with it. They've never included FW models in a 'regular' Codex before. I can't imagine they'll start now. I haven't really heard any rumblings about a combined book at all, but there is the statement that they're not redoing any codexes this year and I think a combined book would count as that. I'd be happy to get a formation or two that combine them out of a Black Crusade army book, since Ad Mech is explicitly called out in the fluff, as these books seem to be how they're handling these codex updates type things.

[Castellan Cato]

Theres been rumors of two potential books:
A) The FW IA14, which is about 100% confirmed as we've seen the art and storyline.  Its just a matter of when.  I would think before Christmas, but I know nothing.  This will bring FW's 30k Mechanicum into 40k.  Rules and stuff will change, so there's not a lot of point in prepping for it now.

B)  The Lady of the rumor tower has said there's a GW combined Ad mech book coming sometime, with at least a flyer and a new dual build robot kit.  But it was supposed to be over the summer like you said, so it could be a very long time coming.

[JeffTibbetts]

Yeah, I heard that rumor with the flyer a while back and then nothing. You'd think if it was ready to roll they might have capitalized on the FW ones just from a timing perspective. I wonder what the hold up is all about? 

[Tiger9gamer]

I have sinking suspicions that the flyer was actually the deathwatch flyer and it was misreported.

 

 

Also, does anyone know if 30k bots will be in 40k with the new book?

[JeffTibbetts]

If you're talking about the IA book, yeah I think so. If you're talking about a combined 'dex, again I'd be gobsmacked if they included 30K units from FW. I would say the Betrayal at Calth stuff showing up in Angels of Death might set a precedent, but those were oddball crossover products that were always intended to pull double duty and are, of course, plastic. 

[Castellan Cato]

I remember seeing art of Castellax and the Thanatar for the IA book.  I think those are the only two that we know are for sure in it. 

 

But I'm pretty sure of them saying that the book definitely wouldn't include everything, and what was there would have rules to show that they are 10k years old and crazy.

[Tyriks]

I also had heard rumors of a combined codex with a couple new goodies.  Not sure though where (probably at least partially here, since this is usually where I get my rumors).  I don't know if or when that will happen, though.

[TempestBlade]

Darn. I have an skitarii force right now and have been waiting to expand it with cult mech since I heard rumors about a joint book. Oh well I guess I'll hold off for the expansion and work on Deathwatch and Space Wolves for now. It's not like I have a shortage of things to get and paint

[Battybattybats]

Thallax were mentioned in white dwarf as still being in use by Ordo Reductor (was this also in one of the codices? I don't recall), but there's a possibility they may restrict what weapons they may use or even give us a new version with modern era weapons.

[Magos Takatus]

I don't recall hearing any actual rumours about the combined Adeptus Mechanicus codex, what I heard pretty much seemed to be wishlisting (myself included). The only information I had was while reading the Skitarius book it mentions how the protragonist "felt the air-to-ground surveyor pulses of the Mechanicus Sky Talon holding position Kilometers above them". Of course this shares it's name with a Forge World Imperial Navy transport VTOL, so it seemed odd for this to be a command and control aircraft for the Admech. 

 

The information we have so far for the Imperial Armour book is pretty interesting. I will probably look into getting it when it releases.

[MoGuy]

Can someone explain to me why the Ad Mech doesn't have a single tank (the Onager is technically a walker) or transport vehicle? I mean... our faction literally produces ALL of those Rhinos etc. the Space Marines always use. Why do we not have access to them? Is there a fluff-reason?

[Mechanicus Tech-Support]

Because apparently the skitarii prefer to walk to battle zones...

From lexicanum "The vast majority of Skitarii troops are not brought into battle by aircraft or armoured personnel carriers, rather they simply march into battle without stopping even if they have to start the journey months in advance".

Personally I think this is silly

[BassWave]

The real reason is that due to the whole Chapter House ordeal, Gw now only makes rules for units with models. I'm sure what happened was they ran out of time to design a transport and fit it in the release schedule.

 

Also they seem resistant to the idea of giving multiple armies the same vehicle even if it makes sense fluffwise. For example Space Wolves use a variant of the Leman Russ tank in the lore, but don't have access to it in their codex.

 

Don't worry, we're surely getting transports in the next FW campaign book that is coming out soon. We also have more robots to look forward to ;)

[MoGuy]

 

Because apparently the skitarii prefer to walk to battle zones...

From lexicanum "The vast majority of Skitarii troops are not brought into battle by aircraft or armoured personnel carriers, rather they simply march into battle without stopping even if they have to start the journey months in advance".

 

Personally I think this is silly

 

 

Yeah, I know. This is really dumb. Most battles begin without a warning (Dark Eldar popping out of the webway for a raid, Tyranids landing on a planet, a Tomb World awaking on an already inhabitated planet etc.). The Skitarii would always be months to late if they were just dropped off on the planet somewhere and had to walk to where the fight is actually happening, which would result in them arriving after the battle has already ended. 

 

 

 

Don't worry, we're surely getting transports in the next FW campaign book that is coming out soon.

 

The problem here is that 30K Mechanicum has 2 transport vehicles that aren't flyers. 

 

The Triaros Armoured Conveyor, which costs over 130 points and isn't even an assault vehicle. And it has no fire hatches. And the Ordinator(?) which costs even more points and it too isn't an assault vehicle. It would be so nice if we had something to transport our Sicarians or E-Priests in that they can assault out of. Or something that our Vanguards/Peltasts could actually fire out of. 

[Magos Takatus]

I also think the background about Skitarii forces walking to battle is ridiculous. They have to be transported to the planet in dropships anyway, so why would you drop them on the other side of the planet and leave them to walk for months to reach their target? The Skitarii book claims their Doctrina Imperatives are relayed from tech priests that are usuallly in orbit, so they are keeping a Mechanicus ship in orbit (or at least in the same system) for months waiting for the Skitarii to saunter over to their objective? How much food/fuel would it take to keep that ship and a task force of Skitarii operational for that long before a single round is fired? They may have originated from caravan escorts but waging a war in that manner is nonsense. The sooner the background gives us air or land transports the better. (Hopefully not a robotic Stegadon/Onager with the Crawler special rule, only Rangers would benefit from that due to their longer range guns)

[Tiger9gamer]

I also think the background about Skitarii forces walking to battle is ridiculous. They have to be transported to the planet in dropships anyway, so why would you drop them on the other side of the planet and leave them to walk for months to reach their target? The Skitarii book claims their Doctrina Imperatives are relayed from tech priests that are usuallly in orbit, so they are keeping a Mechanicus ship in orbit (or at least in the same system) for months waiting for the Skitarii to saunter over to their objective? How much food/fuel would it take to keep that ship and a task force of Skitarii operational for that long before a single round is fired? They may have originated from caravan escorts but waging a war in that manner is nonsense. The sooner the background gives us air or land transports the better. (Hopefully not a robotic Stegadon/Onager with the Crawler special rule, only Rangers would benefit from that due to their longer range guns)

 

 

Whole Heartedly agree. That small piece of fluff makes me really fearful of skitarii falling into a sort of "Codex Astartes" situation, where because of a peace of fluff written editions ago still effects gameplay for whatever reason. Like how the fluff says a battle company is made up of 6 tacts, 2 assault and 2 dev squad, and now almost Every single space marine army is bound to a formation that consists of something like that. in my oppinion it makes things super bland because now you have the same space marine army now across so many armies.

 

 

So basically what I fear is that because the skitarii codex said "and they shall walk" in the first edition then every single variation of them will have them foot slogging down across the battle field rather than use the stuff that makes sense. 

 

Keep in mind though that besides the lack of transports and an HQ I think the skitarii codex is one of the better army books GW has made in a long, long time. The addition of canticles and other admech things would only make it a lot better.

 

Alas, as I said to a few opponents: "For now we Gotta WW1 this battlefield"

[MoGuy]

One thing the fluff give us however are flyers. They are never explicitly named but how else would the Skitarii land on the planet if now with flyers that are capable of low-orbit flight.

 

If we look to Forgeworld I think there is a reasonable hope that we'll get vehicles to transport our guys (maybe even in the next Imperial Armour Book). 

 

 

 

Keep in mind though that besides the lack of transports and an HQ I think the skitarii codex is one of the better army books GW has made in a long, long time. The addition of canticles and other admech things would only make it a lot better.

 

Agreed. The Skitarii are in my opinion a "reasonable powerful" army in an age where we have Space Marine god-formations on the one side and ridiculously underpowered Orks on the other side. 

[Tiger9gamer]

One thing the fluff give us however are flyers. They are never explicitly named but how else would the Skitarii land on the planet if now with flyers that are capable of low-orbit flight.

 

If we look to Forgeworld I think there is a reasonable hope that we'll get vehicles to transport our guys (maybe even in the next Imperial Armour Book). 

 

 

 

Keep in mind though that besides the lack of transports and an HQ I think the skitarii codex is one of the better army books GW has made in a long, long time. The addition of canticles and other admech things would only make it a lot better.

 

Agreed. The Skitarii are in my opinion a "reasonable powerful" army in an age where we have Space Marine god-formations on the one side and ridiculously underpowered Orks on the other side. 

 

Agreed. Hell I faced off against a medusa strike force and wiped the floor with it (he had all the tanks, I had all the haywire and robots... Yea bad match up) and I was wrecking crap left and right with the skitarii arc rifles. If we had more time I think I would have won the game even! 

 

actually, I have one person in my local GW that I think I scarred for life when I used an unbound list of skitarii in rhinos. Every time I bring up the need for transports he just shakes his head in annoyance at the mere thought of it. he even goes so far as to claim that it's not how they were not "supposed to ever have them"

 

To be fair, as someone who used them firsthand, They were pretty good. IT's just the small added boost of hiding behind some AV that really helped the army get to where it needed to go and slaughter everything. They were impervious to Heavy bolters, resistant to torrent Dreadknight flamers and even when a transport blew up the rest of the army was pretty much unscathed by the time they were in action, allowing for full strength volley's to the opponent's face.

 

More thoughts: I suppose the newly released (and stupid expensive/big ) void shield Generator could help us get across the field, but for the amount of points we'd have to dedicate into this idea I don't think it's a worthy substitute. also, the void shield is shared between all models under it's "Umbrella" so as soon as your opponent cracks it the thing is down all over rather than just having one tank wrecked and one squad exposed. also unless you get the pipeline you only have at most two slots to work with assuming a combined force of admech and skitarii.

[CommodusXIII]

The Skitarii novel also had soldiers riding Onager desant to the engagement zone.

[Xisor]

I'm trying to reason it out in my head. The main gains of the main Skitarii formation are how it offsets lack of transports and gets you close.

 

So an unbound army for transports basically puts us into anew even keel- no objective secured, no warlord re-roll, but suitable flexibility to do as we please.

 

In that regard, I'm trying to pinpoint what feels thematically... 'correct'.

 

I've an 800pt 40-Skitarii force (3*10 V, 2*5 R) - so what makes a sensible expansion?

 

- Chimera? The lashing just feel a bit off on them, y'know? It's almost too crude for Skitarii. That said, there was that excellent wee Fehervari story with the Skitarii all in boats...

 

- Rhinos? Cheap and cheerful, but feels a bit too cheap.

 

- Razorback? Small, but they do the job well - I might try a couple for my Ranger squads.

 

- Drop Pods + Aircraft? I like a lot of them, and think they fit neatly, I'm just not quite feeling them at the moment.

 

- Land Raider? Now we're talking. Three aggressively ferrying the Vanguard whilst two Razorbacks roll for Rangers? It feels... correct. Especially if the Land Raiders look to be more venerable beasts of burden than holy relics. (Like the Robots - functional.)

 

- Taurox: an alternative to the Land Raiders in that my skitarii aren't supposed to be superduper galactic elite, but elite for a hive. So the Taurox may do just the perfect job, as well as looking a bit preposterous too.

 

---

 

 

I'd love to see a good dropship though. Similar to drop pods to allow 'rapid first turn deployment', especially if a bit more like an up gunned Arvus... aggressively used rather than super powerful.

[MoGuy]

 

 

The Skitarii novel also had soldiers riding Onager desant to the engagement zone. 

 

I really like the novel! You can find the audio-version on Youtube. Great to listen to while painting.

 

 

Agreed. Hell I faced off against a medusa strike force and wiped the floor with it (he had all the tanks, I had all the haywire and robots... Yea bad match up) and I was wrecking crap left and right with the skitarii arc rifles. If we had more time I think I would have won the game even! 

 

actually, I have one person in my local GW that I think I scarred for life when I used an unbound list of skitarii in rhinos. Every time I bring up the need for transports he just shakes his head in annoyance at the mere thought of it. he even goes so far as to claim that it's not how they were not "supposed to ever have them"

 

I've recently started to collect Dark Eldar. The difference in (inherent) power is very apparent. Even our Dragoon where the guy is literally sitting in the open is more "heavily" armoured than most of their vehicles.  I often play against my buddy's Orks and with the Dark Eldar our games are much closer. It is almost depressing how bad almost all of the Ork stuff is. GW really needs to update the older armies with a Decurion of their own and give them decent formations. That won't fix them but at least bring them closer to the newer codices.

 

Back to topic:

 

When we first heard the rumours about a combined book there were also mentions of what new stuff it may bring. If my memory serves me right it was "a transport vehicle, a flyer and a new robot kit out of which two versions of robots could be build". The flyer would be nice to have and - as mentioned in the novels - is actually a thing that the Ad Mech has. I also expect to see the Mechanicus Drone in the near future (the uncorrupted version of the Nurgle Drone). Either for 30K or maybe with the IA for 40K.

[CommodusXIII]

You can cross aircraft and drop pods off the list. Units can't deploy in allied transports. The Skitarii could deploy on the ground and have a flyer pick them up, but that's a few turns of waste manoeuvring. Drop pods won't work at all.

[Xisor]

CommodusXIII - does that apply to Unbound forces?

[MoGuy]

 

 

You can cross aircraft and drop pods off the list. Units can't deploy in allied transports.

 

Yes, I know. But I never talked about allied transports...? It was rumoured that we get a flyer and a transport in the combined book - so no need for allied vehicles.