Space Marine Codex 2.0

[ZeroWolf]

Depending on when (if) the codex releases, it's time before being invalidated by 11ths Codex Spacemarines ranges from either a year at most (assuming a July/august release) to about 9 months (October/November time).

 

2 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

A new codex is exactly what I was expecting. I really didn't believe that GW would go down the route of supplements for the various codex chapters again.

 

I know GW recently did an updated timeline for future releases, and on that image you can see artwork for a Salamander, and then later on an Imperial Fist. This doesn't indicate a codex, but perhaps a staggered release for the new models that will come with the codex. This is the image I'm referring to:

 

 

 

 

I imagine GW may have changed the release timeline as they try to ride the wave of the success from Space Marine 2?

They can't pivot that fast looking at the way they organised themselves. They plan out factory production years in advance. 

 

It's likely that this was always on the cards regardless of how Space Marine 2 was going to do. If anything, when this schedule was planned, it was likely their belief that SMII was a two year old game when codex 2.0 dropped.

[Cenobite Terminator]

Personally I’d love to see either new supplements or a codex. The current detachment rules are quite bland in my opinion and I’d love to see them spiced up.

[Karhedron]

1 hour ago, Orange Knight said:

Take the Space Wolves and the new Primaris Grey Hunters, Blood Claws and Head Takers. These are unique analogues to Intercessors, Assault Intercessors and Bladeguard Veterans. Because they exist, Space Wolves should no longer have access to the generic versions as they thematically don't make sense anymore, and it's added redundancy.

 

As someone who has 25 Space Wolves Intercessors and a nicely converted squad of SW BGVs, I am moved to vote Heck No! on this suggestion. All this will accomplish will be to massively annoy divergent chapter players who have spent the last 8 years investing in Primaris models.

 

Unit overlap and codex bloat is not a serious enough problem to justify nuking large chunks of peoples' collections, particularly the newest parts.

[Orange Knight]

I know it can annoy players, but GW don't shy away from that. They've scorned people more.

 

You should have seen how much money I spent on lovely vehicles from the Horus Heresy range before they were suddenly relegated to the Legends PDF.

There are ways they could do it, such as Intercessors in a Space Wolf army are now "Legends" - so technically you can still use the models, just as I technically can still run a Spartan.

I'm only suggesting this is done to units that have overlap with generic options, which is at most 2/3 per Chapter.

 

And people can convert them...

 

But the point I'm making is that Games Workshop really want to sell 40k a competitive game, but their uneven codex books, unit redundancy and other choices hamper that design. 

On top of this, the game currently has less thematic elements and rules than it did in past editions.

 

Neither the competitive crowd, nor the beer and pretzel/casual/lore hobbyists are being catered to effectively.

Edited 22 hours ago by Orange Knight

[Karhedron]

Unit redundancy does not affect competitive play as long as the units are balanced wrt each other. It then just comes down to personal choice.

[Orange Knight]

2 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

Unit redundancy does not affect competitive play as long as the units are balanced wrt each other. It then just comes down to personal choice.

 

GW is unable to create balance inside a single book, never mind across multiple factions and sub factions with stacking rules.

 

And when one faction has 100 units, whilst another has 12, it becomes even more difficult to account for all the variables.

 

It must also be said that 40k is a unique beast in the world of wargaming - there are more factions and more units than basically any other wargame. This comes with many positives and many negatives.

 

One evident negative is that half the range is not even available to buy due to stock issues at any given time.

[Dr. Clock]

22 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

25 Space Wolves Intercessors and a nicely converted squad of SW BGVs, I am moved to vote Heck No! on this suggestion.

Certainly the BGVs should stay since they're hard capped by rule of 3 and anyone running a unit in Impulsor is going to be hekkin annoyed when they need to make room for the wolf companions. Wolf Guard should definitely still come in Bladeguard style just like in sternguard or vanguard style...

 

Battleline is a bit of a different story to my mind though. Space Wolves have historically not had the basic Tactical or Assault squads, instead having their own designations. Presumably most SW Intercessor-havers would be prepared to just... use the Grey Hunter and Blood claw rules for those, seeing as the differences between the SW and mainstream kits are relatively minor? 

 

By all means slap a few chainswords on your bolter marines or bolters on your chainsword marines. Or even... don't? If GH are the only 'basic bolter unit' available in the list, then people surely can't complain that you're proxying. Same with assault intercessor > blood claws. I just don't think we need that level of Battleline duplication in the game tbh.

 

All that's to say - keep using your Intercessors even if their name is changed. And if you really prefer the 'mainstream codex' rules for Intercessors as the core to your army (to represent a force of many newly Awoken marines, for instance), you can always just use that codex instead of the SW one when you like!

 

44 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

lovely vehicles from the Horus Heresy range before they were suddenly relegated to the Legends PDF.

 

Definitely a bad look on GW, but I kind of understand the need to keep the lid on the number of marines units available in the meta, and in the app. If marines have it good in terms of unit choice right now, imagine how intense it'd be if they added several types of Sicaran and Kratos and Raider and Rhino and Dreadnought without giving any other faction anything anything near that level of choice (other than Guard maybe, since they'd get a heap of Solar Aux stuff?).

 

Practically, I understand we want to use the minis we bought, and it's a bad feeling to have the rug pulled like that, but I don't know if there's really a better way to do this from GW's perspective without turning 40k Marines into 'Primaris infantry with Heresy tanks' for all intents and purposes. I tend to think of the Legends lists as just 'Index: Horus Heresy', and on that score it's okay for my oldmarines collections.

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

[Mogger351]

To offer an alternative but related stance. What, in reality, is the real difference between a space wolves intercessor and a grey hunter model wise?

 

If intercessors are removed they immediately aren't even needing to be referred to as a proxy for grey hunters, it's almost the same model.

 

The wolf guard and blade guard can have identical loadouts (ignoring the wolf for a minute), so again, they're not a proxy, they’re visually identical, or near enough.

 

Limiting some generic units out of wolves imo doesn't really hurt as they analogous units now.

[Nephaston]

2 minutes ago, Mogger351 said:

To offer an alternative but related stance. What, in reality, is the real difference between a space wolves intercessor and a grey hunter model wise?

 

If intercessors are removed they immediately aren't even needing to be referred to as a proxy for grey hunters, it's almost the same model.

Would need to glue chainswords on intercessors or bolters on assault intercessors. Or, since heavy bolt pistols are bolter sized, just some bigger magazines.

[Evil Eye]

1 hour ago, Orange Knight said:

But the point I'm making is that Games Workshop really want to sell 40k a competitive game, but their uneven codex books, unit redundancy and other choices hamper that design. 

So they need to stop selling it as one.

 

40K has NEVER worked as a competitive game and it never will. Trying to make it work as one has just resulted in a half-hearted mess of a game that fails as the immersive/fluff-driven system core fans enjoyed AND doesn't even cater well to competitive players.

[Orange Knight]

Just now, Evil Eye said:

So they need to stop selling it as one.

 

40K has NEVER worked as a competitive game and it never will. Trying to make it work as one has just resulted in a half-hearted mess of a game that fails as the immersive/fluff-driven system core fans enjoyed AND doesn't even cater well to competitive players.

 

I agree with you. It's neither competitive, nor immersive. 7th edition was an absolute balance mess, but it had all the rule tools to create absolutely fantastic narrative campaigns and thematic game moments that the current game can't match.

 

Unfortunately, the game's meteoric rise in popularity has been in parallel with the increase in focus on the game being a competitive experience.

 

The die has been cast, so to speak.

 

 

[Orange Knight]

47 minutes ago, Dr. Clock said:

Certainly the BGVs should stay since they're hard capped by rule of 3 and anyone running a unit in Impulsor is going to be hekkin annoyed when they need to make room for the wolf companions. 

 

 

I was under the impression that the Hunting Wolves are actually a seperate unit? I could be wrong, and if so that does change the dynamic significantly.

 

You know how in the Nid kits, some boxes come with ripper swarms? I assumed it was something like this.

Edited 20 hours ago by Orange Knight

[Xanthous]

43 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

I was under the impression that the Hunting Wolves are actually a seperate unit? I could be wrong, and if so that does change the dynamic significantly.

They did say this in the stream, but that doesn't mean it's correct. 

 

With regards to Grey Hunters/Intercessors, I can see no reason why "Grey Hunters" couldn't be a designation equivalent to "Battleline" which includes the titular unit but also other variants like Intercessors and Heavy Intercessors. Blood Claws had jump pack and bike variants, why couldn't a Grey Hunter lose the chainsword and pick up a bolt rifle? 

[Karhedron]

1 hour ago, Mogger351 said:

If intercessors are removed they immediately aren't even needing to be referred to as a proxy for grey hunters, it's almost the same model.

 

By the same token they also remove the need for me to buy the new kits. If they take away the option for me to run standard Intercessors, I will just slap a few chainswords on my existing models and not bother with the new kits. Yes they can do it but they will be hurting their own sales.

[HeadlessCross]

2 hours ago, Karhedron said:

 

As someone who has 25 Space Wolves Intercessors and a nicely converted squad of SW BGVs, I am moved to vote Heck No! on this suggestion. All this will accomplish will be to massively annoy divergent chapter players who have spent the last 8 years investing in Primaris models.

 

Unit overlap and codex bloat is not a serious enough problem to justify nuking large chunks of peoples' collections, particularly the newest parts.

Frankly the new Headtakers aren't anything BUT Space Wolves Bladeguard with bespoke rules because they now have a kit. I don't consider "but look there's plastic wolves in the kit too" to really be an actual difference. 

[Karhedron]

1 hour ago, Dr. Clock said:

Space Wolves have historically not had the basic Tactical or Assault squads, instead having their own designations.

 

History is a poor guide in this context. From a rules perspective, players have had SW Intercessors for years. From a fluff POV, there are thousand of SW Intercessors from the Unnumbered Sons now prowling around the Fang. There are also SW Successor chapters (something that never existed before) who are entirely Primaris-based who would not have picked up all the Fenrisian traditions but will still fight in a Wolfish style due to their geneseed.

[Dr. Clock]

49 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

I was under the impression that the Hunting Wolves are actually a seperate unit? I could be wrong, and if so that does change the dynamic significantly.

 

You know how in the Nid kits, some boxes come with ripper swarms? I assumed it was something like this.

From the preview article: "Some are selected as Headtakers, especially those who retain their youthful energy, charging down the toughest foes with packs of loyal wolf companions."

 

I'd take that to mean that you use the whole kit as a single unit of Headtakers: 3 Wolf Guard with their loyal companions. I'd assume that Fenrisian wolves will also still be takeable in 5/10s on their own because they have their own kit for that. However, it's also cool that it looks perfectly feasible to just group 3/6 bladeguard with 3/6 wolves and call them Headtakers under the new rules if you've already got those minis and don't want to lay out for the new kits.

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

[Northern Walker]

2 hours ago, Mogger351 said:

To offer an alternative but related stance. What, in reality, is the real difference between a space wolves intercessor and a grey hunter model wise?

 

If intercessors are removed they immediately aren't even needing to be referred to as a proxy for grey hunters, it's almost the same model.

 

The wolf guard and blade guard can have identical loadouts (ignoring the wolf for a minute), so again, they're not a proxy, they’re visually identical, or near enough.

 

Limiting some generic units out of wolves imo doesn't really hurt as they analogous units now.

Big difference is the availability of bolt rifles, I think they won't take away intercessors because thematically there's no reason for Grey Hunters not to use rifles sometimes.

[TheArtilleryman]

22 minutes ago, Northern Walker said:

Big difference is the availability of bolt rifles, I think they won't take away intercessors because thematically there's no reason for Grey Hunters not to use rifles sometimes.

Agreed. Bolt rifles are a significant difference. AP 0 bolters are frustratingly ineffective in the current rules and it’s the same with infiltrators. I’ve found their shooting to be pretty pathetic and so I’m assuming the same will be the case for Grey Hunters. It’s amazing how much difference that -1 AP makes.

[HeadlessCross]

19 minutes ago, TheArtilleryman said:

Agreed. Bolt rifles are a significant difference. AP 0 bolters are frustratingly ineffective in the current rules and it’s the same with infiltrators. I’ve found their shooting to be pretty pathetic and so I’m assuming the same will be the case for Grey Hunters. It’s amazing how much difference that -1 AP makes.

Mathematically, the very first pip of AP is the most important. 

 

That said, even if Infiltrators had AP-2 guns you'd still mostly take them for their bubble. Any offense is incidental. 

[Northern Walker]

21 minutes ago, TheArtilleryman said:

Agreed. Bolt rifles are a significant difference. AP 0 bolters are frustratingly ineffective in the current rules and it’s the same with infiltrators. I’ve found their shooting to be pretty pathetic and so I’m assuming the same will be the case for Grey Hunters. It’s amazing how much difference that -1 AP makes.

I have nothing but antipathy for the current rules set for weapon profiles. 8th at least felt good to roll buckets of dice, but 9th and 10th feel so utterly meh.

[TheNicronomicon]

It's interesting to speculate but I just don't see the need to get too worked up about what units will/won't be available until we start seeing actual codex/datasheet previews.

 

Please also consider that some options may be locked by Detachment (i.e., the "Your army cannot include any of the following units" rule in Champions of Russ) which would enable both "pure" Fenrisian Space Wolves (straight out the Fang, homie, running Wolves codex armies) and "Primaris" Space Wolves (your Intercessor-packed Wolfspear forces running vanilla Gladius/Vanguard/Firestorm/etc detachments, for example). Karhedron and I wouldn't need to scrap or proxy our wolfed-up Primaris squads, and no purist would necessarily need to sully their collections with Guilliman's nephews.

[Tokugawa]

I can't see any reason to forbid SW players taking basic intercessor. Currently intercessors is an unit with min unit size 5 which provide "sticky obsec". Grey hunters is an unit have similar model appearance but very different functions. 

 

I will always agree a SW opponent use intercessors model as grey hunter, or grey hunters model as intercessor. Ban intercessors in SW detachment…why? It's not the BT-librarian thing.

[Mogger351]

12 hours ago, Northern Walker said:

Big difference is the availability of bolt rifles, I think they won't take away intercessors because thematically there's no reason for Grey Hunters not to use rifles sometimes.

If the only validation for keeping both around is a minor variation in bolter profile, then there isn't a reason.

 

Even for the obsec rule, it's not enough on its own to justify 4 units occupying the same space imo.

[Northern Walker]

3 hours ago, Mogger351 said:

If the only validation for keeping both around is a minor variation in bolter profile, then there isn't a reason.

 

Even for the obsec rule, it's not enough on its own to justify 4 units occupying the same space imo.

GW have made pains to differentiate the capabilities of the rifle from the carbine (or classic bolter). Discarding longer range, higher calibre weapons for experienced infantry is anti-thematic for the Wolves. SW are slanted to melee, but they aren't berserkers in the main and are quite happy fighting at longer range.

There's also clear precedence set by Black Templars having crusader squads and intercessor squads.