What's the pettiest peeve you have in 40k 10th?

[Magos Takatus]

I'd like to  preface this topic by saying that I intend this to be a light-hearted threat rather than vitriolic, so please bear that in mind. There are a lot of issues with 10th edition that people don't like for one reason or another, many of which affect the game significantly, but this is at the other end of the spectrum. What rules change, though seemingly inconsequential, annoys you far more than it has any right to? 

 

For me it is the "Mechanicus Pistol" entry in the Admech Codex.

One of the coolest things about the Adeptus Mechanicus both thematically and as an army is their access to exotic and arcane technology. Unfortunately, in the name of streamlining GW have really hurt that aspect with the Mechanicus Pistol weapon. That single weapon profile accounts for the following:

Radium Serpenta

Eradication Pistol

Radium Pistol

Arc Pistol

Phosphor Blast Pistol

Gamma Pistol

Archao-Revolver

(Laspistol if you go back far enough with Engineseers)

 

Apart from the two Radium weapons, every single one of these weapons uses a completely different technology to deal damage, and could have been put into different niches.

 

By contrast Space Marines have:

Bolt Pistol

Absolvor Bolt Pistol

Heavy Bolt Pistol

 

THREE different types of bolt pistol? This is on top of all the grav pistols, plasma pistols, hand flamers and so on. The Mechanicus Pistols were vastly different, some were anti-infantry, some were cool because they marked targets with glowing phosphor rounds, some messed up vehicles, some punched through heavy infantry armour. They all had cool flavour, looked massively different, and now they all share the same statline. Yet Space Marines get strawberry flavour bolter, banana flavour bolter.... This would be like rolling all the Devastator squad heavy weapons into a single "Big Gun" profile, if you ask me.

 

So yeah, this is petty, doesn't affect the game hugely, but it irrationally annoys me far more than it has any right to. What 10th ED rules changes get on your goat?

[SteveAntilles]

My biggest gripe is no heavy weapons in Krieg, Catachan, or Cadian squads. No basic infantry squad with a heavy is a crime.

[ThaneOfTas]

Oh boy, petty and minor issues.... 

 

This would probably actually have a moderately major impact at competitive levels but I think it's dumb to have the rules be like this anyway, just not in any serious way like my real issues with this edition.

 

1. Precision. Imo the Precision keyword should apply before the to wound roll, rather than afterwards. It's dumb on both extremes, just because Inquisitor Draxus is standing next to some Custodians doesnt mean that she is magically tougher and more difficult to wound once she's been hit. Likewise a tough character should not become easier to wound because he's tagging along with a weaker unit.

 

2. Twin-linked. It should go back to be rerolling to hit rather than to wound. I'm sure that there's some kind of statistical justification for it being this way, but I just do not care, to hit makes more sense, there's a higher number of shots, those shots are more powerful though.

[Magos Takatus]

I really like these! Twin-Linked annoyed me ever since 3rd edition, I was so glad when they finally got rid of it and just put the correct number of guns in a profile, and then they reintroduced it! I was inconsolable. 

[GSCUprising]

On 10/9/2025 at 12:10 PM, Magos Takatus said:

For me it is the "Mechanicus Pistol" entry in the Admech Codex.

One of the coolest things about the Adeptus Mechanicus both thematically and as an army is their access to exotic and arcane technology. Unfortunately, in the name of streamlining GW have really hurt that aspect with the Mechanicus Pistol weapon. That single weapon profile accounts for the following:

Radium Serpenta

Eradication Pistol

Radium Pistol

Arc Pistol

Phosphor Blast Pistol

Gamma Pistol

Archao-Revolver

(Laspistol if you go back far enough with Engineseers)

 

Apart from the two Radium weapons, every single one of these weapons uses a completely different technology to deal damage, and could have been put into different niches.

 

By contrast Space Marines have:

Bolt Pistol

Absolvor Bolt Pistol

Heavy Bolt Pistol

 

THREE different types of bolt pistol? This is on top of all the grav pistols, plasma pistols, hand flamers and so on. The Mechanicus Pistols were vastly different, some were anti-infantry, some were cool because they marked targets with glowing phosphor rounds, some messed up vehicles, some punched through heavy infantry armour. They all had cool flavour, looked massively different, and now they all share the same statline. Yet Space Marines get strawberry flavour bolter, banana flavour bolter.... This would be like rolling all the Devastator squad heavy weapons into a single "Big Gun" profile, if you ask me.

I don't agree this is petty, but this certainly should be resolved. The lack of choice for our character models and, indeed, many of our units, really is detrimental to my own modelling and enjoyment of the hobby. I want my "little soldiers" to be varied from the next list over. This is quite noticeable with my own preferred army, Genestealer Cultists. For example, despite a plethora of characters to choose from, if I recall correctly only the Sanctus has another weapon option.

 

On the other side of the coin, my Eldar Exarchs have a minimum of three loadouts (Scorpions) up to six choices (Dire Avengers). Even then, I miss them have Exarch powers you could buy.

 

I would like to see a return to more customisation of our armies again, so they can feel like our own and develop lore, make friendly rivalries with other players (I have a Neophyte named Sven with a mining laser who is notorious in my gaming group for the luckiest rolls ever). It personalises it more.

 

And don't get me started on Legends...

 

OK, rant over, haha! Everyone plays in their own way, and that's great. I just want to see more variety again. Please feel free to counter-argument me. Constructive criticism always welcome.

[Valkyrion]

16 hours ago, ThaneOfTas said:

2. Twin-linked. It should go back to be rerolling to hit rather than to wound. I'm sure that there's some kind of statistical justification for it being this way, but I just do not care, to hit makes more sense, there's a higher number of shots, those shots are more powerful though.

 

It's a balancing abstraction. e.g Twin Linked To Hit on a model that hits on 2+ is less valuable than it is on To Hit 5+, so by making it the To Wound roll you make the weapon better instead of the firer. 

I also actually get it from a physics POV, I think - if you have two barrels so close to each other and pull the trigger the chances of hitting with only 1 of them must be really small - either both miss or both hit, and if both hit there must be more damage. I'm fully prepared to be wrong about that, though!

[Grotsmasha]

22 hours ago, ThaneOfTas said:

2. Twin-linked. It should go back to be rerolling to hit rather than to wound. I'm sure that there's some kind of statistical justification for it being this way, but I just do not care, to hit makes more sense, there's a higher number of shots, those shots are more powerful though.

 

WHEN I played still, my group had a house rule for twin linked. Single rolls for to hit, a miss was a miss, but a hit was double wounds.

[Kommisar_K]

   Force weapons and power weapons. Almost every Astartes or Imperium faction has lost its cool axes/swords/staves/spears to this mediocre profile. 

   Also my brother plays death guard and I notice the various large axes, maces, mauls, and even power fists have been consolidated into the "heavy plague weapon." 

   And now you say the various Mechanic um sidearms have been combined into "Mechanicum pistol." 

   Grrrrrrrrr

   I don't miss the 40-minute list-building adventures but they could at least keep the weapons feeling special 

   Anyway that's all from me lol. 

[Evil Eye]

Weapon streamlining and option removal in general bothers me something fierce. Combi-weapons are the obvious case but as a Tyranid fan I can think of multiple cases that bother me. Notably Tyranid Warrior melee weapons, Ravener thorax guns (before they were removed altogether...), Tyrants being unable to take devourers or deathspitters (because they aren't in the box despite the kit being literally designed to be compatible with the Carnifex weapons!) and the complete annihilation of biomorphs.

 

Honestly the way wargear is handled now in general is a damn nightmare- we have a billion datasheets for minor variations of the same weapon, other distinct weapons get mushed into one profile, and no points costs for wargear means there is no reason not to max out on spamming the best options. IMO having an armoury of weapons and wargear that most units selected from and worked basically the same regardless of who was using them made far, far more sense.

 

The damage system too is an overly abstract and "gamey" mess. I know WHY they made it so small arms can now pierce tank armour but it's still terrible; there are far better ways of making infantry able to deal with vehicles than "everything can hurt everything". Grenades, power fists etc.

[SvenIronhand]

Eldar pet peeves:

-Falcons and Wave Serpents should have the same rule as Valkyries do.

-Warlocks should be able to attach to Aspect Warriors.

[Lathe Biosas]

My poor little Cyclops Demolition Vehicle (with its OC of 0) can't hold objectives or perform actions.

[GSCUprising]

2 hours ago, Lathe Biosas said:

My poor little Cyclops Demolition Vehicle (with its OC of 0) can't hold objectives or perform actions.

It is so small and so ANGRY. It's not interested in holding objectives. It only wants to strain at its leash until you finally let it finally uncork that little bottle of hatred in its heart. 

[Evil Eye]

I love how the Cyclops (and its slightly bigger bro the Centaur) both have the same rhomboidal track shape as the Russ. Nice little bit of design synergy.

[GSCUprising]

I think, for me,  and this might not count as petty, is the dropping of some Legends units. I, and others, have spent money, time, and effort on these models, only for them to be dropped without a word. I've a very small Imperial Agents army (about 500pts) I intend on painting once I complete my goals for my GSC/Brood Brothers force and the...oh Lord, the name escapes me...the orang-utan...well, I won't be able to use him as he appears to have been dropped before I could even put him on the table!

 

When will I lose the ability to deploy my Eldar Phoenix and Nightwing? The thing that would really tick me off is if they drop the Macharius Vulcan (329), Malcador (Brutus), and the Minotaur (The Iron Duke), as I have carefully crafted them into my writing. Sure, they're not 'meta,' but I paid for them, assembled and painted them, and I enjoy more fluffy, narrative games.

 

OK, I'm done! I know GW is a business and they want people to buy the newer models, but it does feel rather like a palming off of those who have been in the hobby for a long time.

[Magos Takatus]

22 hours ago, GSCUprising said:

I think, for me,  and this might not count as petty, is the dropping of some Legends units. I, and others, have spent money, time, and effort on these models, only for them to be dropped without a word. I've a very small Imperial Agents army (about 500pts) I intend on painting once I complete my goals for my GSC/Brood Brothers force and the...oh Lord, the name escapes me...the orang-utan...well, I won't be able to use him as he appears to have been dropped before I could even put him on the table!

 

When will I lose the ability to deploy my Eldar Phoenix and Nightwing? The thing that would really tick me off is if they drop the Macharius Vulcan (329), Malcador (Brutus), and the Minotaur (The Iron Duke), as I have carefully crafted them into my writing. Sure, they're not 'meta,' but I paid for them, assembled and painted them, and I enjoy more fluffy, narrative games.

 

OK, I'm done! I know GW is a business and they want people to buy the newer models, but it does feel rather like a palming off of those who have been in the hobby for a long time.

 

I really liked the idea of doing a chapter of marines that had a lot of relics from the past but had also embraced the Primaris equipment gladly. MkX armour looks like a hybrid of mk8 and mk4 armour, and I ran with that. Sadly my army theme became "most of your army is barely supported". The FW rules limited the number of reli units you could take, so I was going to rotate them in and out of army lists to taste, but feeling their rules could be cut any minute does feel bad.

 

I also have an Ork Mega Dread, plus I've got a Nightwing and Phoenix in my pile of shame. Most of those are on the chopping block, but I think the Phoenix is already gone from Legends, isn't it? 

 

I like Forge World stuff because it's niche, exotic and in many cases gave a new lease of life to older 40k models. The Relic Predators being inspired by the mk1 Rhino/Predator design, and the Eldar fliers from back when Epic was a thing. Nowadays when I hear people talking about Forge World models on Youtube all I seem to hear is "Too expensive!", "Resin sucks!" and "Bad game balance!". These things miss the point entirely. A Forge World model wasn't something to just cheaply and efficiently slap into a meta army list swiped off the internet, it was a passion project that you would lovingly and carefully assemble knowing that in a hobby that allowed your guys to be unique, it was another, more pronounced extreme of that. The lore of the variant Tau Hammerhead turrets were that they were older designs side-lined by the development of the Hammerhead and Ion Cannon models, consigning them to supporting roles. They weren't the coolest unit in the Tau inventory, but it made for a great story hook. Maybe your guys have been cut off from resupply? Maybe they are the protectors of a backwater Tau world that have hand-me-down tech while the glory boys are swanning about on the other side of Tau space with their experimental battlesuits? My Knight Castigator was one of my more nerve-wracking modelling projects, but it was a modelling project that I undertook slowly, carefully, I let it test my model-making skills and I'm proud of the result, but most of my Forge World models are like that, and a great deal of them are sitting in Legends now, or they have no rules in current 40k at all.

On 10/11/2025 at 9:12 PM, GSCUprising said:

It is so small and so ANGRY. It's not interested in holding objectives. It only wants to strain at its leash until you finally let it finally uncork that little bottle of hatred in its heart. 

Truly the Chihuahua of the Imperium. 

[Evil Eye]

1 hour ago, Magos Takatus said:

I like Forge World stuff because it's niche, exotic and in many cases gave a new lease of life to older 40k models. The Relic Predators being inspired by the mk1 Rhino/Predator design, and the Eldar fliers from back when Epic was a thing. Nowadays when I hear people talking about Forge World models on Youtube all I seem to hear is "Too expensive!", "Resin sucks!" and "Bad game balance!". These things miss the point entirely. A Forge World model wasn't something to just cheaply and efficiently slap into a meta army list swiped off the internet, it was a passion project that you would lovingly and carefully assemble knowing that in a hobby that allowed your guys to be unique, it was another, more pronounced extreme of that. The lore of the variant Tau Hammerhead turrets were that they were older designs side-lined by the development of the Hammerhead and Ion Cannon models, consigning them to supporting roles. They weren't the coolest unit in the Tau inventory, but it made for a great story hook. Maybe your guys have been cut off from resupply? Maybe they are the protectors of a backwater Tau world that have hand-me-down tech while the glory boys are swanning about on the other side of Tau space with their experimental battlesuits? My Knight Castigator was one of my more nerve-wracking modelling projects, but it was a modelling project that I undertook slowly, carefully, I let it test my model-making skills and I'm proud of the result, but most of my Forge World models are like that, and a great deal of them are sitting in Legends now, or they have no rules in current 40k at all.

I wish I could Love react this twice. Forge World existed to make cool, super-detailed models of inherently niche concepts (obscure second-line tanks, super-heavies too large for the average game, etc) first and foremost, with the rules primarily being there as a "You get to play this awesome model too!" excuse. My favourite tank in the entire Imperial arsenal, the Malcador Defender, is objectively a terrible unit- but that's the entire point. The rules are there to let you run a decrepit, obsolete wreck of a tank in a thematic way, if it was really good it'd be missing the point entirely.

 

Large resin vehicles can be horrible to build, to be fair, but I also feel some people seem to consider a single atom of resin as part of a kit as a complete deal-breaker, which really doesn't make much sense to me.

[Pacific81]

In the plastic model kit world, resin kit builders are seen as something of a group of self-flagellating masochists, which I think is fair enough when you consider the quality of many modern plastic kits! 

 

I agree though, bits are fine, but I find I have to have the energy for it, knowing I am likely to have an uphill battle.

[Magos Takatus]

I had to saw apart pewter models for conversions in the past, resin feels much easier to me than that a lot of the time. *grognard mode activated* 

[NTaW]

It took me a while, but I think I've narrowed down my pettiest peeve about 10th edition to two things.

 

Terrain silhouettes and prescribed table layouts. I only played one game of 9th before dubbing it "the lawyers edition" and switching to painting/reading hobby involvement. This reminds me of that. I don't begrudge people for playing this way at all but I avoid it when I can.

 

Flyers being about as useful as paper airplanes being thrown over the table. Snapshots + skyfire in 7th was a bit too tough, and -1 to hit in 8th was sort of meh, but now they truly seem useless. I'd love to see a change to their durability and perhaps movement mechanics for the next edition.

[Lathe Biosas]

I take it all back. My biggest peeve is that this is not a real product.

[GSCUprising]

On 10/15/2025 at 12:09 PM, NTaW said:

Flyers being about as useful as paper airplanes being thrown over the table. Snapshots + skyfire in 7th was a bit too tough, and -1 to hit in 8th was sort of meh, but now they truly seem useless. I'd love to see a change to their durability and perhaps movement mechanics for the next edition.

I do agree. GW has never, to my knowledge, got flyers right, yet they do some really nice flyer models. Very proud of the work I put into my Valkyrie, Phoenix, and Nightwing. Lovely models. And I am slowly working on a modified Valkyrie. They tend to be over-costed, but, to be fair, the 10th ed rules are better than previous editions.

[NTaW]

2 hours ago, GSCUprising said:

I do agree. GW has never, to my knowledge, got flyers right, yet they do some really nice flyer models. Very proud of the work I put into my Valkyrie, Phoenix, and Nightwing. Lovely models. And I am slowly working on a modified Valkyrie. They tend to be over-costed, but, to be fair, the 10th ed rules are better than previous editions.

 

I too love my Flyer models. I had two Stormravens before the unit type even existed, and though I sold one I still have two Doom Scythes. My Vendetta is long gone to another owner but perhaps it still exists as I converted it despite being Legends at best by now. I even used to play and still own the rules of GW's minigame Stormcloud Attack, though I admit the Flyer rules that basically added a 2nd 6x4 table to the game at the end of 7th were wildly clunky. The supplement was called Death From the Skies I think.

 

I also agree that 10th edition is quite fun to play. Specifically, the lack of restrictions in army building is quite liberating and allows for both competitive and total fluff armies equally.

 

For Flyers I think that being hit on 5+ would be an interesting middle ground for the rules that I've experienced. Access to Skyfire would be the way to mitigate the restriction instead of to-hit modifiers in my mind.

[Pacific81]

19 hours ago, GSCUprising said:

I do agree. GW has never, to my knowledge, got flyers right, yet they do some really nice flyer models. Very proud of the work I put into my Valkyrie, Phoenix, and Nightwing. Lovely models. And I am slowly working on a modified Valkyrie. They tend to be over-costed, but, to be fair, the 10th ed rules are better than previous editions.

 

Everyone will laugh at this, but think my last ever game of 'modern' 40k (I think it was 6th edition!) was partly down to fliers. My army, an entirely converted pre-heresy force that had taken hundreds of hours to build, being carpet bombed by what looked like unpainted Tomix toys (I forget which flier they were). Some legs glued to a base (which apparently were a captain with power fist) finishing off my troops in close combat was the final nail in the coffin 

[Magos Takatus]

29 minutes ago, Pacific81 said:

 

Everyone will laugh at this, but think my last ever game of 'modern' 40k (I think it was 6th edition!) was partly down to fliers. My army, an entirely converted pre-heresy force that had taken hundreds of hours to build, being carpet bombed by what looked like unpainted Tomix toys (I forget which flier they were). Some legs glued to a base (which apparently were a captain with power fist) finishing off my troops in close combat was the final nail in the coffin 

I bet that last part was a right kick in the teeth. 

 

I think Forge World have the right idea that most fliers would just pass over the board delivering an attack run and then exit. It seems weird that supposedly supersonic jetfighters are moving around the board barely faster than bikes blocking space with their large bases. I know having build something fancy like a Marauder bomber built and painted only for it to not stay on the board might feel a little underwhelming, but having aircraft chugging comparatively slowly around the board just doesn't sit right with me. It's a shame, because most of the non-marine fliers look great in my opinion (sorry marine players).

[SvenIronhand]

On 10/17/2025 at 4:17 AM, Magos Takatus said:

I think Forge World have the right idea that most fliers would just pass over the board delivering an attack run and then exit. It seems weird that supposedly supersonic jetfighters are moving around the board barely faster than bikes blocking space with their large bases. I know having build something fancy like a Marauder bomber built and painted only for it to not stay on the board might feel a little underwhelming, but having aircraft chugging comparatively slowly around the board just doesn't sit right with me. It's a shame, because most of the non-marine fliers look great in my opinion (sorry marine players).

I think the supersonics should operate this way. The VTOLs and troop carriers like the Valkyrie should be able to hover still.