Summoning With Cypher

[Doom Herald]

I had originally posted this in Daemons because it seemed more relevent, bu this board is much more active and with cypher being "Chaos" now, its still relevent.

 

Can Cypher summon Daemons while in an Imperium army?

 

The rules say any Chaos character can summon Daemonic ritual units. Cypher has that keyword, along with Imperium. The rules also state that when you put your army together they must share a faction keyword. Obviously, Daemons dont share a faction with other Imperium forces, except fallen, but the rules say you dont actually add summoned daemons to your army roster, you set points aside for it. I know it sounds like cheeky shenanigans, but if anyone were to lead an Imperium army and suddenly pull daemons out of the warp, the champion of the Fallen doesnt seem too out there compared to others.

[Sception]

As far as I can tell, yes, he can.

[CrimsonReign]

raw - yes you can

[Kol Saresk]

Aren't summoned daemons supposed to be treated as reinforcements?

[Kol Saresk]

And to add to it, doesn't the BRB require any reinforcements and the points you set aside for them to be written down on your army roster?

 

Would that not fall in the army restriction?

[Commissar K.]

It depends per type of play.

 

In Matched play all of the units in your army must have the same faction Keyword. All of the units in the army includes Reinforcements (any).

Based on that, say you pick Imperium as your Faction Keyword you cannot include Daemons who do not have Faction Keyword Imperium.

 

(Faction) Keyword Chaos is not the same as Keyword Imperium.

[Doom Herald]

And to add to it, doesn't the BRB require any reinforcements and the points you set aside for them to be written down on your army roster?

 

Would that not fall in the army restriction?

The rules for Daemonic Ritual specificly state that you do not add the units to your roster. You only set points aside and can summon any Daemon that your Daemonic Ritual roll would allow, provided tou have the points available.

 

I honestly plan on using this to summon Be'lakor with Daemon hosts already on the field along with my Malal/Mallice themed pariah detachment. Narrative play, im pretty sure there would be little issue with it, matched play is where the rules leave it sticky since you are specificly told not to add them to your army roster.

Edited July 6, 2017 by ThanatosMalleus

[Kol Saresk]

The rules for Daemonic Ritual only say that daemons are to be treated as reinforcements. It says nothing about reinforcement points.

 

The BRB is what says that you're supposed to include reinforcements and reinforcement points on your roster, after using the summoning of daemons as an example of how to summon reinforcements via an ability or psychic power.

 

So, Index: Chaos says summoned daemons are reinforcements. BRB says reinforcements are a part of your army. And that as such, they have to share a keyword woth every single other unit in your army, except those that have the Unaligned keyword.

[Doom Herald]

The rules for Daemonic Ritual only say that daemons are to be treated as reinforcements. It says nothing about reinforcement points.

 

The BRB is what says that you're supposed to include reinforcements and reinforcement points on your roster, after using the summoning of daemons as an example of how to summon reinforcements via an ability or psychic power.

 

So, Index: Chaos says summoned daemons are reinforcements. BRB says reinforcements are a part of your army. And that as such, they have to share a keyword woth every single other unit in your army, except those that have the Unaligned keyword.

The Index Chaos does say that you do not have to name the units you wish to summon on your army roster, just the points you have set aside for it.

 

Now, if the Index says that the Daemons are reinforcements and the book says reinforcements are considered a part of your army, I cant argue against that. What page can I find that on for my own reference?

Edited July 6, 2017 by ThanatosMalleus

[Commissar K.]

Matched play rules. Army Faction and Reinforcement Points. Page 214. Edited July 6, 2017 by Commissar K.

[Kol Saresk]

Page 68 is the page that describes daemonic ritual and that daemons are counted as reinforcements.

 

Can't say I see anything about not having to name the summoned daemons on your roster. Is it on a different page?

 

As for the BRB, page 214 is the page I'm looking at. Some of this is just reiterating in summary.

 

It describes that you can summon units with abilities or psychic powers, with one of the most common being Daemons. In a matched play game, you have to set aside the points for reinforcements.

 

When you summon reinforcements, you have to pay the difference. If there are not enough points to pay for the units, then you have to decrease the units points by either minis and/or upgrades until you can pay for it. If you cannot pay for it, then the ability or psychic power still counts as used.

 

Then it goes to the section Army Roster, where it says the Roster has to include the details of every unit in armor, including points and upgrades. It makes no distinction between reinforcements and starting field units.

 

So on the one hand, I guess you can argue the lack of explicitly saying reinforcement units must be written down means they don't have to be, but the rules on how you use reinforcement points requires you to have readily available information on the points costs of your reinforcement units.

 

So the unit details have to be written down somewhere for you to have on hand and I don't think having a datasheet is going to sidestep the Faction requirement.

 

Arguably, this is just for matched play, which requires you to use points and battle-forged armies. In narrative and open play, you neither have to worry about points/reinforcement points and faction restrictions.

Edited July 6, 2017 by Kol Saresk

[Commissar K.]

The important part is that Reinforcements add to your army. What you can add to your army depents per Faction Keyword used.

 

E.g. Faction Keyword Imperium can add Faction Keyword Imperium units.

[Kol Saresk]

Thinking on it, a datasheet wouldn't meet the requirements for describing the details of your units, exactly because they don't list points. Everything that describes writing down the points cost of units says to write it down in your army roster. And since your army roster is what goes back to determining your army faction keyword, that would be where the problem lies IMO.

[Lord Abaia]

Are you suggesting that a pure Death Guard faction army would no longer be able to use the (soon to be released) special relics, stratagems and whatever else if they summon some plague bearers that don't have the Death Guard keyword? I seriously doubt that. With codexes hitting soon the faction keyword aspect of this game is imminently going to be much more specific than large keywords like Chaos and Imperium.

 

And I would argue that you absolutely do not need to have a list of your summoned reinforcements written down. The entire point of summoning is that you don't have to decide what you are summoning up until you make your summoning roll and can choose based on the situation on the table. Especially considering you don't know what you are able to summon until you make your summoning roll and compare it to power levels. As for readily having points and power levels available I've actually already got that in a handy little book called Index: Chaos. Take a look at the table with daemon points values. Most of them include wargear options. That's all you need. The idea that you would need to write down every possible unit you might summon is ridiculous because if you have a big enough collection you are just transcribing the entire daemon section of the index.

 

In AoS matched play the benefit of summoning is pretty much to get around list building restrictions. Only allowed to have so many leaders? It's okay you can summon a herald and still have a legal list. Only allowed to have x number of behemoths? Go ahead summon a greater daemon with those points you set aside. It's not the same game, but it is the same company and it’s very likely that the same idea applies to 40k. Especially since summoning is just flat out worse than starting with those models on the table.

 

Neither of you have shown a passage from the core rules, the advanced rules, the Index, an FAQ, a designer’s intent, or a second hand text message from Pete Foley that says that reinforcements need to be decided ahead of time, added to your roster, or must share your army’s faction keyword. And while Cypher summoning daemons in a keyword Imperium army is a fairly niche issue, a sorcerer in a keyword Word Bearers army using the relics from the new CSM codex will be fairly common. We need this addressed in an FAQ to stop players with an assumption filled understanding of the core rules from telling summoning players that their lists are illegal or require a hand written copy of the daemon codex to run.

[Kol Saresk]

No, I haven't shown them. I've described them in detail with page references. However, if you have to have a picture book, then by all means, here is your picture book.

Does that help you feel better?

Although I'm not sure what the point of your Death Guard example is other than to be aggressive?

As for what future Codexes will do will be determined by the future Codexes when they are published. So until they exist, they have no relevance.

Otherwise I could use them as an excuse to be all willy nilly and make an army however I want because "I'm sure they will have the necessary rules".

Also, if you don't know your reinforcements ahead of time, then how do you know how many points you need to set aside so you can actually summon them?

I mean, I guess you could be the idiot who doesn't set aside enough points and then in the middle of the game you have to figure out how to break down the unit so it actually can be summoned. But that seems stupid and easily avoidable, courtesy of thinking ahead.

[Doom Herald]

Future specific Codexes i doubt will be issues because your DeathGuard will be able to take DeathGuard relics, while still being in a general Chaos army.

 

Im at work now, but when i get home ill look up the part that says you doubt have to list out your Daemons for summoning. It must be a different page or paragraph, but its there

[Sception]

You don't have to commit to specific units in advance.  You just have to have the necessary points set aside.  For instance, you could be playing a Slaanesh army with 92 reserve points set aside.  During the game, you could summon either one seeker chariot or 2 fiends or 10 daemonettes.  Think of it as a sideboard.

 

Obviously, you'll need to have available the rules and models for any units you might summon.

 

As for whether summoned units have to abide by your army faction, that's less clear to me.  In Age of Sigmar, the answer to that is no, and that's how I read the daemon summoning rules at first, but I could see reading it the other way.  Is something that would be nice to see official clarification on.  As for how or whether the answer to that question will impact codex rules, until we have those rules nobody can say.  I'm pretty sure that GW won't intentionally write rules preventing, say, death guard armies from summoning nurgle daemons during the game, so even if careless wording of the rules initially has that effect, it's probably something that would be fixed in errata soon after.

[Kol Saresk]

I can agree that you don't have to say "these points are specifically for these units". But it seems like it makes good sense that they should be written down somewhere on the roster, because I don't know anyone who is going to be happy with their opponent stopping the game midturn and trying to build a unit from the ground up so it can fit into whatever RPs they do have.

 

And honestly, I'd be giving an opponent a serious hard time if he was playing an Imperial army, and then he tried to use Cypher to call in Warp Talons from Reinforcements.

 

So I mean really, if we'd expect Terminators, Raptors, and Wulfen to follow Faction rules, then we should be expecting Daemons to as well.

 

And I don't see anyone using a lack of being explicitly told to write down reinforcement units to say they can do those kinds of crazy shenanigans.

Edited July 6, 2017 by Kol Saresk

[Lord Abaia]

@Kol Saresk

Did you actually read it though?

 

 

The points you set aside are called your reinforcement points, and need to be recorded on your army roster.

It says you must add the reinforcement points to your roster. Nothing else.

 

 

 

If there are not enough points in the pool to pay for the unit, you must either decrease the size of the unit (down to its minimum unit size), or the number of upgrades for it or decide not to use it after all.

How would you change the size and upgrades of a unit if it is a fixed entity on an army roster?

 

I also don't see how the Death Guard faction example is anything but relevant. You are again assuming that there will be a special mechanic so that Death Guard can summon to get around the non-existent faction restriction that you assumed to begin with. There is no need for all that rules bloat. The way it works is simple.

 

Also I'm not sure you understand the way summoning works if you think only an idiot would pick units on the fly. Say I set aside 180pts for reinforcements on my roster, because I want to summon a Daemon Prince with talons. But I only roll a 6. At this point I can summon nothing and try for the daemon prince again, or I can summon say a herald of slaanesh on a chariot for 116pts leaving me with 64 pts to summon something else with like some chaos furies. It doesn't take long.

[Kol Saresk]

Yes, I did read them. I've also been reading the BRB and found an interesting passage on page 177.

 

But before we get to that passage, if I understand everyone's arguments, in this edition, reinforcement units are not to be considered actually part of your army until they are summoned, correct?

[Kol Saresk]

Feel free to answer.

[Kol Saresk]

The reason i ask is because page 177 of the BRB states that units that are not summoned from reserves are to be counted as destroyed.

Seems like a really weird thing for the rules to say, if what you say is true. Since it would mean your reinforcements are considered part of your army while still in the "reinforcement pool". And if they're considered part of your army.....

Suffice to say, however this goes, the Golden Rule that has applied for eons still applies: talk with your opponent before hand. Make sure they're okay.

Also, I still don't understand the Death Guard example. Death Guard armies by definition of the rules have to have the keywords Death Guard and Nurgle. Plague Bearers have the Nurgle keyword. That follows the army keyword restriction and follows the rules for daemonic rituals where Nurgle characters can only summon Nurgle daemons. So don't know what you're freaking out about there.

Also, we're talking about cross-faction summoning, not a Chaos character summoning Chaos daemons.

Unless you think Imperial Guardsmen should be capable of summoning Warp Talons from reinforcements? Because we're talking about things like that.

[Kol Saresk]

Let's do this for a brain exercise.

 

I'm going to make an army with Cypher and two units of Fallen.

 

Accordig to Magpie, my army roster is going to be one Vanguard detachment. It is going to be 530 points between Cypher and three max strength, no wargear upgrade units of Fallen. That leaves 970 points for reserves.

 

Not included in my army roster, but brought with me, I'm going to bring some Warp Talons, some Daemonettes, and a Blood Angels Thunderhawk.

 

Since they're not a part of my army, they should be completely legal since all units can either be summoned or Deep Strike'd from reinforcements, using my reinforcement points. Although I have to actually roll for the daemons while I can just drop in the Warp Talons and Thunderhawk at the end of the movement phase.

 

This army should be RAW legal, no?

 

If not, then why not?

[Commissar K.]

Exact Kol.

 

As with AoS the Keyword is what makes your army. What you can add to your army still has to abide to that rule too.

 

Point in question is, Reinforcement options still follow the rules required to be part of a legal army because they are an addition to that army.

 

Keywords arnt lost because a datasheet isnt written down as a deploying army.

 

Cypher in question can be part of an Imperium army, however all units, including Reinforcements, have to be capable of becomming part of that army.

 

Cypher can summon Daemons,but can only hve options for this with a Chaos Army Faction because Daemons do not have the Imperium keyword.

[Lord Abaia]

The reason i ask is because page 177 of the BRB states that units that are not summoned from reserves are to be counted as destroyed.

Okay. So what? How can you know how many units were destroyed for the purpose of kill points if you don't know how many units I would have made? Obviously units that are not part of your army can't be destroyed if they don't exist yet. I don't see how this passage supports your argument at all. Or more specifically how it even implies that a summoned unit is part of the army at roster creation.

Seems like a really weird thing for the rules to say, if what you say is true. Since it would mean your reinforcements are considered part of your army while still in the "reinforcement pool". And if they're considered part of your army.....

Nope. It's really not that weird a thing to say. This passage doesn't even mention the "reinforcement pool" And it keeps using the words set up. The same words used on the dataslates for units with the various rules allowing them to be "set up" off the board (formerly known as deep striking.) All this tells me is that a summoned Daemon can't move after being summoned and that I probably loose my reinforcement points after turn 3.

Suffice to say, however this goes, the Golden Rule that has applied for eons still applies: talk with your opponent before hand. Make sure they're okay.

Also, I still don't understand the Death Guard example. Death Guard armies by definition of the rules have to have the keywords Death Guard and Nurgle. Plague Bearers have the Nurgle keyword. That follows the army keyword restriction and follows the rules for daemonic rituals where Nurgle characters can only summon Nurgle daemons. So don't know what you're freaking out about there.

First I'm not freaking out about Death Guard. I just think that it is a pertinent example of how faction keywords work because they have a codex incoming. Any chaos faction more specific than Chaos will also illustrate it. But I'll stick with DG for now to explain.

Okay so you get your new DG codex and it has some special booger pistol relic. To take it you must have a faction keyword Death Guard army. Okay so you just take some Plague Marines, some Pox Walkers, a bell ringer, and a Chaos Lord armed with the booger pistol. Awesome! You also want to summon some daemons though so you set aside some points for some Plague Bearers. According to your interpretation he cannot summon anything without breaking his pure Death Guard faction keyword army. But who cares, they both have Chaos and Nurgle keywords, right? No. Death Guard is not Nurgle is not Chaos. You took the booger pistol. The booger pistol is not a relic of a keyword Nurgle army. You are not running a Nurgle army. You have now made your list illegal. According to you.

Also, we're talking about cross-faction summoning, not a Chaos character summoning Chaos daemons.

A different faction is a different faction. Keyword Imperium =/= keyword Blood Angels. Keyword Emperor's Children =/= keyword slaanesh. Keyword Imperium =/= Chaos. There's no difference.

Unless you think Imperial Guardsmen should be capable of summoning Warp Talons from reinforcements? Because we're talking about things like that.

Nobody can summon Warp Talons. Read your index. They don't have the Daemonic Ritual rule. And Imperial Guardsmen can't summon anything. Cypher however can. And I think he can do it regardless of the composition of the army he is in.