Some musings on 5th Edition

After a light review of the 5th Edition 40k rulebook, I offer how every army is affected by the rules changes.

First some general things.
Vehicles - Vehicles ability to move and fire their weapons has been drastically reduced. The other side of this is the new rules with line of sight and the near-impossibility to hide units. With the new scatter rules, Ordnance becomes less useful, especially when your opponent will likely be receiving a 4+ cover save.
Walkers (Specifically Dreadnoughts) - They can still be only hit in the front armor in combat, grenades hit on a 6+ only. No longer can they take glancing hits in close combat, ouch.
Skimmers - Lose the always hit on a 6+ in Close Combat. If you don't move a skimmer, it is auto-hit. Moving 6" or less means you are hit on a 4+ and no auto-glance. Look out.

Now the Armies themselves.

Grey Knights - Still suck. They gain some survivability in the Land Raider, but are still on the low end of causing a lot of damage. They are still good mobile firepower units, but will take more fire from heavy weapons.

Sisters of Battle - The run option is nice, but since they will likely be coming in typical Rhino Rush fashion, that ability is a little moot. Their Retributors get a little boost because of increased line of sight. Their acts of faith however, lose a little due to increased cover saves. The run option is nice for the Repentia and Arco-Flagellants because it lets them get into combat faster. I think they also got the low end of the stick in this regard.

Space Marines (All types and Chapters) - Devastators get a boost as well just like Retributors. Although the new rules for the Plasma Cannon are straight crap. Roll a d6 to see if you overheat, then scatter 2d6-BS; garbage. Run, as always, rewards poor players for not thinking ahead. Scouts get the ability to come in from short table edges, which will probably not be that good. Sniper Rifles get a little better. Land Speeders get a bit worse, losing their auto-glance and having to reduce speed to fire all their weapons. Since their basic Troops are good, they should do well in objective based games. They have a new codex coming out, expect it to be heavily tailored to the rules of 5th.


Chaos Space Marines - Very similar to Space Marines. Lash gets even better because it is MUCH harder to hide from it, expect to see a lot of Dual-Lash lists. As a chaos player, you will need it.

Chaos Daemons - This list gets a little worse because it is harder to Deep Strike out of line-of-sight and very close to your opponent. Run lets them redeploy on a bad scatter (As you can Run after Deepstrike)

Necrons - This army actually gets a bit better. The increased Line-of-sight is good because Necrons usually do not rely on low AP weapons, so the cover aspect is not an issue. Run lets them close faster to get the bulk of their 24 inch weapons into range. The only downside is the Monolith, which is now easier to hit in combat, but harder to destroy in the shooting phase.

Imperial Guard - We get quite the double edged sword with the Guard. Their ordnance heavy tanks get the super-scatter nerf. Increased LOS means that you can bring more of your heavy weapon to bear, but the multitude of models on your side may cause LOS problems. (Giving everyone a cover save) Basilisk and Mortar scatter is just stupid inaccurate (2d6 added together) In 3rd and 4th editions, I loved Mortars; Now, why bother? Guard gain a little in terms of close combat, as now monstrous creatures and extreme close combat units can no longer consolidate into a new unit after close combat, so this should alleviate large scale army slaughter from one or two units.

Tau - Tau get roughly the same benefits/disadvantages as the Guard, except that they won't have such a problem with deployment zone crowding. On the other hand, Crisis Suits jumping back behind terrain after shooting will be less easier due to "True LOS" Their Skimmers will be better because of one of their vehicle upgrades will give them a 4+ cover save all the time. Fish of Fury gets a bit of a kick in the balls because due to the "True LOS rule" models that disembark must see "through the eyes of the model to their target" because of the models themselves, they may be able to be fired at, but not fire themselves. LAME.

Eldar - Kiss Mech Eldar goodbye. Eldar skimmers now have to choose between firing and getting a cover save for moving fast. They also suffer from the same nut-kick as Fish of Fury. On the plus side, Pathfinders will be all but invincible in any kind of cover. Having the Avatar Run is nice, as it lets him keep up with his faster kin. Harlequins still rock thought, even with the toning down of Rending.

Dark Eldar - I suddenly feel horrible for every single Dark Eldar player. You are screwed. You will find it almost impossible to hide your Raiders from incoming fire. If you do not get first turn, you are DEAD. Dark Eldar need a new codex, badly.

The aforementioned armies change a little (Except Dark Eldar) and will not require major overhauls as most of the disadvantages are complemented by benefits. The following 2 lists, however, change extremely.

Orks - The Green Tide becomes amazing and virtually unstoppable. Run lets them close even faster than before. Expect to see first turn runs and second turn fleet/assaults. Close combat becomes even more vicious as the counter attack move gets more Orks into the fight. Coupled with the fearlessness, and GW giving away cover saves like candy, Orks will be a force to be reckoned with.

Tyranids - Tyranids get AWESOME. Their troops will have no problems holding objectives (4+ cover, +go to ground, +lurk = 2+ Cover saves for basic troops.) Nidzilla becomes furiously awesome. The ability to run lets the big guns (Devourers) get into range quicker, the 4+ cover saves everywhere keep the bugs around longer. Lictors allow any other nid within 3 inches to re-roll misses in close combat. Holy crap Tyranids are going to be good.

-Mike