Age of Darkness Podcast - Facebook
A `little` write-up about the Heresy Weekender. I`m sure this will be covered more on an upcoming podcast.
Malevolence
Lets not shy away from the elephant in the room- Book 8 not being at the event.
It was always intended for Book 8 to be released at the Weekender. However, currently it is in a shipping container on a Chinese cargo ship somewhere in the world. It is completely down to international shipping cause as to why Book 8 wasn`t available - not down to the actions of FW. Due to current political climates in Europe and the U.K, international shipping is in a state of flux and delay and sadly, Book 8 has been caught up in that. However, they did allow people at the event to pre-order Book 8 with the bonus of receiving the book before it goes on general release. I know this is not as good as actually having the book in hand but does show a positive response to the customers as there is no confirmed expectation of when it will arrive. FW / GW could easily have turned around and stated that people would have to wait. Yes, it's not ideal but it is something and a positive response to the situation.
There were two open copies of Book 8 available and I did manage to have a look at one, and the information that follows comes from a pair of seminars but I`ve combined it all together as its one topic. I`ll break this down into sections on Blood Angels; White Scars; Daemons and Psyarkana.
Blood Angels
Focusing on the Unification Wars and Great Crusade. The IXth were originally conceived as a `fire-and-forget` weapon. They were deployed into areas and left to crusade by themselves. The gene-seed of the IXth was purposely designed to be used on degenerate or mutated humans so that the legion could recruit from anywhere in the galaxy.
The Signis Prime campaign covers the whole of the narrative across the Signis system and doesn`t just focus on the events covered in Fear to Tread. This all follows the usual FW campaign system-style.
The legion-rules for the Blood Angels are mostly the same as they appeared in Book 6 with a few tweaks to clarify intent (Blades of Perdition acting only on multi-wound models for example). The units are focused on two key areas: Sanguinius` Household represented by the Angels Tears and Crimson Paladins and then the Dawn Breakers. The Angel`s Tears are a destroyer-based unit while the Crimson Paladins are designed to anchor a flank and slow the enemy down whilst the rest of the army does what it needs. The Dawn Breakers are a speartip-unit designed to destroy key points of enemy resistance and first strikes.
Raldaron represents the Baalite officer class and the balance in the legion. The other special character represents the old Terran-element and is a more destructive, aggressive element to the army. Sanguinius was designed to be a `beat-stick` but his rules were challenging. Eventually, he is a jump infantry model with the ability to vector strike and grants all jump troops the ability to use their jump pack in both movement and assault. He has different weapon options - the sword is the anti-infantry slayer whereas the Spear is a more focused killing weapon. It may be thrown and then Sanguinius relies on a sword.
The team also discussed why Sanguinuary Guard are not included as a separate unit. At this stage of the Blood Angel`s development, the SG have a different role than they do in 40k. During the Great Crusade and Heresy, the SG are used as command squads and the rules team feel that they are best represented by the existing command squad profile.
White Scars
During the Unification Wars and the early stages of the Great Crusade, the Vth Legion were assigned as Pioneer Companies (scouts) to Expeditionary Fleets. They were there to push the boundaries of the Imperium and explore the edges of known space. Over time, these Pioneer Companies developed their own traditions, style of fighting, iconography and cultures.
By the time the Khan was re-united with his legion, the Pioneer Companies were run down - some had only 30 men left - as they hadn`t been reinforced and left to their own devices. The Khan`s first role was to unite the different cultures, languages and style of warfare of the Pioneer Companies. This explains why to a large extent, Chogorian-culture is so prevalent in the Vth - it's designed to be over-arching to unite the different components of the Pioneer Companies.
Book 8 also explores the Vth legions relationship with dreadnoughts. During the Great Crusade and the Heresy, the Vth does utilise dreadnoughts. However, they don`t match the prefered fighting style of the legion so the interered astartes is uncomfortable with the internment. Traditionally, the dreadnoughts are assigned as guardians of reliquaries - places that hold the legion gene-seed, or legion artifacts or act as repositories of lore. They are also free to assign themselves to any combat zone they feel like. To the Scars themselves, the appearance of dreadnoughts is generally considered to be an ill-omen and it is worth noting that prior to the Chondax campaign, there was the greatest concentration of Vth legion dreadnoughts assigning themselves to the campaign.
In terms of special units, the seminars didn`t really explore these in depth. One unit is an assassination squad in recon armour that is designed to target characters. One unit that was mentioned was that the Scar get access to variations of the scimitar jet-bike. One adaptation is a version that gives them heavier armour whilst a different version is a specialist assault variant. They do also have a javelin variant with a kheres and reaper autocannon.
The Khan does have a jetbike as an upgrade option. To represent his unpredictability and the fact that his opponents underestimate him, on the first turn of a combat, the Khan always strikes first.
The Chondax campaign system represents low-level warfare between the Alpha Legion and the Vth. The aim of the Alpha Legion was to slow the progress the Scars were making and to restrict them from hearing about the Heresy. The campaign is based on using lower point value games rather than the usual 2500-3000 points we are used to.
Once again, the Legion rules are a re-balancing of the existing rules from Book 6 and just see tweaks and small adoptions.
Daemonology
Much of these hasn`t changed since my previous write-ups so feel free to look over the summaries from other Open Days and last years Weekender. However, we do have some greater clarifications.
The daemons of the Ruinstorm list is extremely flexible and is designed to keep your opponent on their toes. The army list is focused on a limited number of core units ranging from greater daemons, daemon princes, daemon lords, lesser daemons, beasts, brutes and cavalry. These give you the basic profile for each unit.
You then pick a Dominion. This gives you army-wide special rules and specific objectives for a mission. As daemons are not concerned with seizing ground or capturing territory, they are more concerned with following the Pantheons wishes. A couple of examples of objectives are: gaining victory points for each unit destroyed for the Dominion of Blood.
There are six Dominions in total - one for each of the major Pantheon; one which you gain victory points for the destruction of daemon units (strange but one for the old, old lore of the Realm of Chaos) and one other that I couldn`t find out.
Once a Dominion is selected, you may then pick an Enemation for each unit. This allows the unit to be modified by adding wings, or rending claws, or greater initiative. What this allows the daemon player to do is make each unit unique. Nothing needs to be the same even if it shares the same base profile.
What this means is that the Ruinstorm list is extremely flexible. In terms of narrative, it also represents that the Imperium has no idea about the Warp at this stage. If a player puts down a unit of bloodletters, we - the player - know how that unit will play on the table. With the enemations rules, those bloodletter models may have rending, they may strike faster, they may have a better save. Combined with the objectives from the Dominion, it keeps the opponent guessing what the Ruinstorm army will be doing.
The Warp table re-appears in a modified way. At the start of the game, for the first two turns, the daemons get bonuses to their profile; in the final two turns, their profile weakens. This represents the warp flowing strongly at the start of the battle and giving strength to the daemons and then waning in the latter stages. The warp table is also used when daemons fail a morale check. Unlike 40k, daemons are not fearless in AoD. Instead, when they fail a morale check they roll on the Warp table. Most of the time, this is bad as it will cause extra wounds on the unit. However, as the warp is capricious, it might make the daemons stronger. The daemons also roll on the table when hit with weapons like psyk-out grenades (see below in the Psyarkana section).
Deployment is completed through warp rifts that I have previously discussed in earlier summaries.
Armies that can summon daemons (Word Bearers I`m looking at you!) still use the Ruinstorm list. However, summoned daemons do not use any rules from the Dominion or Enemation sections, and they are not affected the profile changes due to the game turn. Summoned daemons represent a more stable form of daemon created for a purpose and controlled by the will of a mortal, not one of the Pantheon.
There is also a conscious choice not to use the words Nurgle, Tzeentch, Slaanesh or Khorne. This is due to the IMperiums lack of knowledge as well as during the Heresy the Chaos powers were more united (to an extent). It is still possible to create a specialist army of the one major powers but I personally feel you are missing out on some of the fun of the list.
Ka`bandha does exist as a special character - he really, really does not like Sanguinius...
Overall, I`m really excited by the Ruinstorm list. Playtesting has revealed that marines generally have a slight edge but only if they play the long game. The army list will be a meta-changer because it adds so many options but unlike the Talons-list, won`t be a meta-breaker. Armies will have to take different units / weapons to deal with a Ruinstorm list. The list is also designed to be used with any GW models - examples were given of using the Daughters of Khaine snake-girls or harpies. This could a modellers dream in the same way that the Militia and Cults list is for the Imperial Army.
Psyarkana
This section of the book discusses the Imperiums growing awareness of the Warp and its use of tools that were banned under the Edict of Nikea that suddenly, due to the effects of the warp, suddenly become useful.
Psyarkana explores the Legions` use of equipment that affects the warp and breaks down into either personal wargear or upgrades for certain units such as Destroyers. Much of this equipment comes with risks for the user but does gain bonuses verses psykers, daemons or warp-users. In terms of narrative, much of this dates from the Dark Age of Technology and is only broken out because of its noticeable effect on the daemons.
This wargear is designed for use in any legion force and offers options for legion forces to challenge daemon, or psyker-heavy armies. Thousand Sons players may be… disgruntled.
Misc.
Book 8 also covers a few generic units for the Legion army list in the form of 5 new consuls. Some of these include:
Armourer - assigned to heavy support squads and gives their weapons master-crafted.
Warmonger - a centurion on his way to being a preator. Focuses on combat.
One looks after the ancients of the Legion and gives bonuses to dreadnoughts.
The last two are psyker based and give either loyalists or traitors access to psychic powers that aren`t part of the librarius or diabolism. These represent those members of the ex-librarius who begin to use their powers in an uncontrolled or legionaries that have begun to dabble in daemonology.
One of the surprises from Book 8 was the inclusion of a new Custodes list. This includes new units like the jump infantry recently released as well as a new gunship based on the existing flyer. The army list includes new points value to rebalance units as well as the tidying-up of unit profiles such as the removal of misericordia as they have no in-game effect.
It was also explained why there are no Alpha Legion or VIth legion units as discussed at previous open days. They were removed due to constraints of space - however the information is all written and may appear in a future book.
Book 9
Work on Book 9 is underway and already some Dark Angel units are in playtesting.
The book will cover the Thramas Crusade and the campaign system will reflect the larger role of that. All the campaigns in the Black Books so far cover legion warfare on a relatively low-scale. The Thramas Crusade is a full crusade that includes not just legionary war but also elements of titan legions, the Imperial Army and mechanicum. The campaign rules will focus on the prosecution of war on this larger scale.
Book 9 will explore the First Legions background and the use of the Wings as a `doctrine of war` rather than a separate organisation. This means that, like the way it is portrayed in the Heresy novels, that members of the different wings are spread amongst the companies and when needed, gather together to carry out their specialised mode of war. However, the First will still use the basic legion army list but it was unclear on how the Wing will be used - although the obvious use will be through the use of Rites of War.
The book will also explore how the First Legion was used as a test-bed for astartes war and that the First have a basis in Terran equipment that is either not accessible or not widely used by the other legions. Part of the reliance on Terran technology was also a fail-safe in case the Mechanicum got out of hand and the First would be deployed against them without a reliance on Martian technology. This includes the use of Terran battle-automata!
Finally, the book will include a full Dark Mechanicum army list and explore the levels of technology proscribed by the Emperor.
The Future of Age of Darkness
Firstly, we can confirm the existence of a new FAQ that will be released `soon`. As well as clarifying some rules changes (augury scanners have been reduced to 18” as an example as the previous removal of range was a typo), it also includes profile changes.
Destroyers have been given a points drop to 115 for 5 and jump packs are now +5 points a model. Combined with the Psyarkana rules, we should be seeing more Destroyers now. Magnus` profile has been replaced with one where some of his previous abilities still exist but are now upgrades that cost X points.
The prospect of a book of missions was also raised to which the team replied that they would like to do a book in that way but it depends on scheduling and time to write it alongside other products.
Discussing the selling out of Book 4 and 6, these books will now be re-printed as softback versions. It is viewed that if other Black Books go out of stock, the same will happen to them. The question was raised of what will happen if there is a rules change. The response was that if that did happen, they would look at re-publishing the narrative sections as a separate book(s) without the rules.
The team also mentioned that once Book 9 is released and all the 18 legions have rules, they would like to do a revised copy of the Astartes red books and re-balance / update the units. This is entirely down to time in the product line and space to write the material alongside new Black Books.
It was also announced that FW consider the Heresy to be ⅓ of the way through at this stage of the Black Books. They are committed to continuing the product range. Future Black Books will re-visit the legions, and other forces, and investigate the effect that the Heresy is having on them. Either the fall to Chaos for the Traitors, or the changes to the Imperial legions in the shock of the betrayal. A good example of this would be the Slaves to Darkness novel and how the traitor legions begin to realise what they have allied with.
What follows is a lot of conjecture and inference based on hints that were discussed at the Weekender. Nothing was confirmed and the FW team was very close-lipped about everything. However, it is positive to see that plans are being laid for the future.
The team have been discussing the problem of getting new players involved into the Heresy. They have ruled out Start Collecting boxes as this does not fit the `style` of the Heresy. However, they have discussed ways of getting new players involved. They would not be drawn on the prospect of a new starter set, or the production of new plastic kits. The team would confirm that they are looking at the existing plastic range and what could be done with the current models and a wider distribution.
It was also confirmed that FW view Adeptus Titanicus as another way to push the Heresy storyline forward - albeit with a different perspective. They strongly believe that AT is part of the wider Heresy setting and should be considered as part of the Black Book series of telling the narrative arc.
It is also worth noting that recent painting videos of the Luna Wolves and putting resin weapons on the plastic contemptor include the Horus Heresy logo - which has never previously happened. It was also announced in a seminar that the FW team have `big plans` for the Heresy this year and it will be promoted in a way that we `have never seen before`.
Inevitably, the prospect of rules changes was raised.
The team would not be drawn on this other than to say that there have been discussions on changing the current rules. Whatever the change would be, they did heavily suggest that basis of the system would be 7th edition as that gave the granularity that they feel the Heresy needs to reflect the particular setting. They also said that if there were to be changes, then nothing would happen until after Book 9 to ensure that all legions and main forces (Legion, Militia, Auxilia, Mechanicum, Dark Mechanicum and Daemons) would all be released under the same system.
FInally, I chatted with the White Dwarf team as to why we rarely see AoD features. The explanation was simple: Because AoD is focused on FW and FW is not available through FLGS and GW stores, White Dwarf do not want to promote something that is not easily accessible for large numbers of the community. However, the WD team did state that they were happy for readers` involvement and showing off readers` armies etc. They also stated that if FW had a big release - like Book 8 - then they would be happy to cover it.
There have been some big changes behind the scenes in FW and the Citadel design studio. This mostly focuses on that from now on, GW had sole control of any rules involving 8th edition and AoS. FW now produce the models - as they have always done - but GW Studio will now produce the rules for that model.
This is a huge positive for the Heresy. Neil and Anuj are now free to focus entirely on the Heresy without having to also deal with 8th edition rules for 40k. This means that we should be seeing more regular releases - either model or rules. Book 9 is already being written and the team is hoping to have that released in 2020 as previously mentioned at Open Days and the 2019 Weekender.
The team also have their own email for FAQs (
[email protected]). Anuj does read all the emails but cannot respond to them. The team want feedback in order to make any changes that are needed.
They also explained that they would rather bring out these changes through books (such as the updated Custodes list in Book 8) rather than FAQs as that is easier for new players entering the Heresy to know that the rules in a book are the current version.
Adeptus Titanicus
My god - this game is great and the amount of effort being put into the models and background by the Specialist Team is huge; demonstrating a high level of commitment to the system.
The first area that the AT team discussed was the shock of how popular the game has become. The recent LCTB products are not down to product recall - it is due to items selling out. As an example, the legio gryphonicus decal sheet was believed to have enough stock to last a year - it lasted 1 month! All of these items on LCTB will return or will look at alternate ways to get out to the community. One mention was weapon cards and terminals being available as a PDF download.
Doom of Molech is the next campaign book for AT and is based on the events of Vengeful Spirit. The book focuses on knight households and will include the rules for seven different knight households and relevant stratagems. There will also be rules for running knight-only forces with no titans present. The book will follow the same format as Titandeath with some background and narrative, scenarios that reflect the events of the Battle of Molech, special rules for the knights and legios present as well as additional dangerous environments. This is the second of a regular set of campaign books that will cover all the major engagements of the Heresy - Calth and Tallarn were the most popular requests.
Eventually, minor knight households will receive a combined A4 decal sheet that will cover several knight houses outside of the main ones included on the titan legio decals.
The Grandmaster Edition is also due to be re-released at some stage this year.
They showed us a variety of new weapons in either 3D renders such as the carapace gatling blasters for the warlord, and the carapace vulcan mega-bolter for the reaver. The warp missile looks amazing and is designed to be detached once fired. They had to develop so many different designs for the warp missile that they have decided to release all the missiles that existed in the original game (that includes: plasma, haywire, blind, vortex). Most of the weapons that currently exist on the weapon cards have now been designed. Future weapons that do not have a card may have the weapon card initially released as a PDF download with later physical release. Questoris weapons such as the powerfist and missile pods are also intended to be designed and produced. There is also q possibility of legio-specific weapons but this would not be considered until there is a larger range of general titan weapons.
There are also plans for regular plastic releases of titans, knights or terrain - in fact, we saw the second set of terrain previewed at the event. This add spires to the existing kits. One thought is to create a terrain pack of bits that could be added to titan bases. This would focus on items such as relay pipes, crates, ruins etc.
They would also like to create the mechanicum knight-variants but are unsure of whether that would be a new plastic kit or resin upgrades to the existing models. This also applies to the missing cerastus-pattern weapons.
There will also be releases of gaming accessories. This would include: dice (focusing on traitor or loyalist first rather than legio-specific); new command terminals which may also become a PDF download.
Ordo Sinister will eventually see a release but the team are unclear on how to make them appear `sinister` or the effect psychic powers may have on the game.
They would also like to investigate the possibility of rules for titan ranks beyond the senior princeps - they may include special character titans like the Dias Irae.
One area that for me personally was exciting was the idea of producing a resource for creating your own `build a legio` rules. This may take the form of a table where you select special rules, wargear and a stratagem. It was mooted that this may be a White Dwarf article and certainly seemed popular with the audience.
