Monthly Vox: 4 (August, 2021)

 Howdy! I hope you're reading this in August, or else I've been a bit tardy. This month has been an interesting one. I expressed my excitement a month ago for the new Black Templars supplement and we've seen even more news since that I've been covering on the blog extensively. 

This month has been a growth period for the blog. I've tried writing about new topics, utilising varying formats and lengths to see what feels and reads well. Hell, I even wrote an environmentalism piece about Games Workshop which actually received great feedback from people I've spoken to about it. 

Earlier in the month, I wrote a long piece about Warhammer 40K's Crusade Ruleset which definitely didn't get much traction. It definitely seems as though 'short and sweet' is the way to go for this blog. Quick 2-minute reads for people on the crapper or their lunch-break. I'm all for it!

But alas, you've eaten your veggies, onto the meat!

Modelling and Painting

Last month, I have a general inventory of my pile o' shame. I can safely say that I have made a decent dent, either by kit-bashing more characters out of existing troops, or by actually painting things. Huzzah!

Again, not counting heads, transfers, or bases, the list currently consists of:

• 3x Infiltrator 
• 1x Infiltrator Sergeant 
• 2x Eliminator 
• 1x Eliminator Sergeant 
• 1x Kit-bashed Captain in Terminator Armour 
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Captain w/ Plasma Pistol + Power Fist 
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Techmarine 
• 1x Bladeguard Veteran 
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Captain w/ Master-crafted Auto Bolt Rifle + Master-crafted Power Sword 
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Lieutenant w/ Bolt Pistol + Master-crafted Power Sword 
• 1x Magnetized Invictor Tactical Warsuit 
• 1x Magnetized Impulsor (Half-Painted)
• 1x Magnetized Venerable Dreadnought (Half-painted) 
• 1x Primaris Chaplain on Bike (Half-painted) 
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Lieutenant w/ Bolt Pistol + Master-crafted Stalker Bolt Rifle
• 1x Kit-bashed Primaris Lieutenant in Reiver Armour

As I said last month, I've been trying not to buy any more kits (with the exception of templar-dedicated releases) until this pile gets way smaller and honestly it's going well. Any units that have appeared on this list, such as the Primaris Lieutenant in Reiver Armour were kitbashed from models and bits I already owned. 

Primaris Captain in Gravis Armour (Painting)

This month saw the painting of one of my favourite HQ units. I created Marshal Reinhardt some more heavy-duty armour for crushing heretics. I even chose to include a helmet/head belonging to one of the Emperor's Children since I'm considering picking up some heretics when the CSM codex drops! (Possible hint at a future conquest? 👀)

In my typical dumbass fashion, I sprayed a bit too much matte varnish on the model, muting the colours considerably and adding a slightly chalky appearance. Currently looking into getting that fixed up. Also his base still needs "crustifying"...

Primaris Lieutenant in Reiver Armour (Modelling)

Cannibalising one of my Infiltrators, I was able to put some bits together to create a true angel of death. This Reiver Lieutenant needs a bit of paint and then he'll be ready to drop in on some heretics and scare the Emperor into them. I utilised some spare infiltrator bits, along with a left-over pistol from my Vanguard Veterans, as well as a head I found in a bits bundle on eBay.

Primaris Lieutenant in Phobos Armour (Painting)

This guy was a delight to paint. He features, quite-possibly, my cleanest highlights to-date. This model still needs proper basing (notice a theme?)

Closing Statement

This month has been Fistful of Beans' busiest so far! I've been making plans to purchase a domain name and also make small investments into advertising since the bulk of my exposure is self-promotion in discord/instagram. I've also been considering establishing a YouTube channel but with the university term closing in, I'm not sure I could reliably and consistently upload so will probably put that off for a while.

In terms of content, I have a few ideas in the pipeline including a segment in which I look at custom forces/chapters designed by the wonderful hobby community. I'll also be pivoting the blog towards regular bi-weekly posts with smaller pieces in-between, just to get a bit of consistency. Though I am not a motivated person and this will probably fall flat in the first week if I get lazy or struggle with ideas.

Thanks for another awesome month. Hope you've all had a good summer holiday. Let's get back to work so we can pay off scalpers in November when the Templars box drops.

Cheers,
Ryan

My Initial Experience With Warhammer+

Warhammer+ has received mixed reception from the community so far. While I, personally, was not initially a fan of the idea. I thought I'd see what it had to offer and invested the whopping £4.99 for the first month (the things I do for this blog) and was pleasantly surprised. 

I made sure to steer clear of the service for it's first few days of release. Anyone who has used a service on release or stayed up til 4am for a game's multiplayer servers to go live, will tell you to just wait. Doing so, I was able to avoid the litany of issues other users have been experiencing while signing up for, paying for, and using the platform. So here's my first thoughts on the platform after spending the good part of a day delving into it.

Note: I made a great effort to avoid any spoilers and would consider this article completely Spoiler Free so you may read ahead without fear.

Warhammer TV

Quite possibly the main attraction of Warhammer+ is Warhammer TV, Games Workshop's new streaming service. It currently features:

• The first episode of 'Blood and Duty' an interesting 3D animation centred around a command squad of Blood Angels heading down onto a corrupted world to recover their lost Captain.
• The first 3 episodes of 'Hammer and Bolter' a fantastic 2D animation that delivers bite-sized lore snippets and windows into the grimdark universe of 40K with brilliant narrative elements. My favourite of the three is the first episode, 'Death's Hand', following Inquisitor Kiamoro as he fights to defy a deathly fate. Well worth the watch. 
• Two Battle Reports featuring the usual suspects. One see's Nick and his Ultramarines against Patrick's Necrons in a 40K bout. The other see's Nick's Stormcast Eternals against Patrick's Orruk Warclans in an Age of Sigmar battle. Both feature excellent editing, similar formatting, and excellent introductory narrations from Toby Longworth.
• Numerous Tutorials and Classes covering basic techniques all the way up to their 'Masterclass' series that covers more advanced topics like wet blending and skin-tone colour theory. 
• The 'Learn to Play' series, covering the ins and outs of all of Games Workshop's major titles like 40k, AoS, Blood Bowl, and the others. 
• A handful of Cinematic Trailers for recent major releases like 40k's 9th edition and the recently released Kill Team animated-trailer.

All in all, the battle reports and animations, alone,  add up to around 4 hours of content. A little lacklustre but a solid foundation for what's to come. Some of the animations are also of questionable quality in some aspects. Blood and Duty features some of the jankiest lip-sync I have ever seen. My friend also pointed out a completely static dreadnought in episode 3 of Hammer and Bolter that looks very out of place in the scene. Generally though, I have no gripes with any of the content provided in this service.

The Warhammer Vault

The Warhammer Vault is phenomenal in my opinion, so long as you don't mind a bit of reading. It currently features around 50 viewable PDFs covering all range of topics and literature. While I'm disappointed at the lack of Black Library content available on this section of the platform, there is still hours of reading here, such as: 

• Lore: Inside the vault, you gain access to lore in spades. The Gathering Storm series, Santus Reach, Mighty Battles in an Age of Undending War, a handful of Warhammer Underworlds books. 
• Painting Materials: While there is currently only one painting guide, the Vault feature's 30 issues of 'Warhammer: Visions' to seek inspiration from and marvel at magnificently painted models from the editors of White Dwarf.
• Toilet Reading: The Vault also comes with every issue of White Dwarf published since January 2020, for a total of 9 issues (presumably with more to come). So I can say with a fair amount of confidence, that Warhammer+ basically includes a White Dwarf subscription as well.

While I am certainly happy with the amount of content in the Vault at launch, the website formatting leaves much to be desired, with the only page featured in the vault literally being a wall of cover art and zero categoric sorting. I want to feel like I'm in a library, not flipping through vinyl albums at HMV.

Is It Worth The Money?

All in all, in it's current state, for £4.99 a month, absolutely. As long as content of a comparable quantity to what is seen now continues to release, Warhammer+ has a fairly bright future ahead. The service, combined with it's £10 store credit voucher and exclusive model, definitely seems worth the money in it's current state. However, only time will tell if it is able to live up to it's own expectations.

Closing Statement

So this has been a brief rundown on what to expect from the initial release of Warhammer+, along with my thoughts on it's various services. I'm interested to see where things go from here. 
What about you? Will you sub to WH+? Have you already? Have some thoughts? I'm interested to hear other opinions on this controversial new service. Leave a comment using Blogger's awkward system or drop me a comment/message over on my Instagram: @fistfulofbeans.

Cheers for reading!
Ryan

All The Better To Purge You With: A Look At The New Black Templar Pyreblaster and Primaris Initiate

 I'll try and contain my excitement so I'm not squealing like a little girl, but it really seems like Games Workshop are going balls-deep with the Black Templars right now. A couple of days ago over on the Warhammer Community, Games Workshop showed off the new model for a 'Primaris Initiate with Pyreblaster', along with the stats! 

Just in case you weren't already convinced they were coming, here he is! The Primaris Initiate heavily implies the existence of Primaris Crusader Squads and, to top it off, the chains that bind this goofy weapon to this brother's wrist, along with the signature Maltese Cross on his helm and pauldrons, gives us our first look at what could be included within the Primaris Black Templar Upgrade Sprue. 

Obviously we could have guessed the contents but it's nice to see it in the...flesh? On the flipside, the crest on the armour is not the standard imperial Aquilla, implying a dedicated kit. After all; they do not wear his symbol. They are his symbol.

A lot of people have complained (shocker) that the marine's hand is too close to the vents of the flamer. Now I'm not a techpriest, but don't those vent holes look like they spew horizontally out the sides? I'm sure our brother will be fine. Don't worry yourselves. 

In signature Black Templar fashion, our boys in black have broke the knob off their wargear with the new 'Pyreblaster' flamer sporting a 15" range! Now while there was a little confusion in the beginning, since GW accidentally uploaded the wrong weapon stats, giving it D2 instead of D1, we do have the stats for this new Tyranid-griller:

The real question in my mind is; will this new weapon be equip-able by the every [Initiate] model in a unit, or will it just be a '1 per X models' type deal? I would love to see a 10-man blob of these chaps spewing out potentially more shots than Primaris Intercessors with Auto Bolt Rifle, with a crazy -2 AP in the tactical doctrine (assuming we keep access to doctrines).

I'd also love to see a themed stratagem based around Flamers that would accompany this weapon nicely. Perhaps extra damage or a minimum number of shots? We will have to see, going forward. 

I'll try to keep you posted on any and all new releases the Black Templars receive in the lead up to their codex release in November. Stay tuned!

Ryan

Another Month, Another Ork Release

Games Workshop has dropped another Rumour Engine article over on the Warhammer Community that has been almost-unanimously been accepted to be a new Ork model/unit, seemingly following the more tribal and animalistic aesthetic of the Beastsnaggas, compared to the the more industrial metal-scrap look of the classic Orks (which I honestly prefer).

Whatever creature this is, they're clearly ripped, sporting a muscular body and the aforementioned tribal look of the "clothes". Now, while I'd like to believe this is another model release for the Orks of 40K, their time in the proverbial spotlight may be over. Games Workshop is making way for other releases, detailed in their Road Map earlier this month. While this could be one last release before they get their codex in September, it could just as easily be a new AoS ork variant. After all, with AoS taking a minor shift in it's proportions and style, this could be overdue.

What do you think it could be? Hit me up in the comments or over on my Instagram, @fistfulofbeans where I post hobby related pictures and memes while plugging this blog constantly.

Writer's Note:

I know this was a shorter read compared to some of my other posts. I plan on producing smaller articles going forward covering the almost-daily Warcom releases while also working on the bigger projects and posts I have in the pipeline. Expect shorter more-frequent posts from here on!

Cheers, 
Ryan

Why Games Workshop Should Care More About Recycling Plastic Sprues

It's no secret that most plastic Games Workshop model kit's come with a shed of excess plastic. I have a drawer full of old sprues that I'm just itching to get rid of. However, I firmly believe it's important to recycle and, in the hobby, it's certainly nice to have an excess of materials and bits. As such, I try not to get rid of anything I might need. 

That being said, the sprue pile is getting high and it got me thinking a bit. Surely this stuff is recyclable, right?

The Problem

In truth, it's not quite so easy. Throwing away your sprues in a standard recycling bin or generic trash/rubbish receptacle will almost-certainly insure that it is incinerated (or worse, put in a landfill). Games Workshop plastic is actually made up of  high-impact polystyrene (or HIPS) which is rarely ever facilitated by your run-of-the-mill recycling plants, requiring a facility with the correct setups and equipment to make use of this kind of plastic.

In fact, it's very possible that filtering GW's particular flavour of plastic and then shipping it to somewhere it can be dealt with, could produce a higher carbon footprint than just burning the stuff, though I'm no ecologist and this would vary highly on geographic location. Another issue is the cost, higher costs mean lower incentives, recycling is a business and there are budgets to balance. Without giving political implementation to this article, I doubt the UK Government would take it upon themselves to deal with the issue, though that is another discussion entirely I won't get into. 

The Solutions

There aren't many solutions that don't involve direct intervention from Games Workshop themselves but that being said, there are still solutions to help minimise plastic wastage from our favourite hobby.

Only Buy What You Need

Now, obviously this is going to be a pretty futile point but here me out. How much unpainted plastic are you currently hoarding right now? Supply and Demand dictates that for each model you buy, one will need to be produced. Logically, you could just buy the models as and when you are to paint them. Obviously, Games Workshop directly prohibits this with it's time-limited hoards that it immediately feeds to scalpers but I digress. 

Maybe just hold out on that unit of Bladeguard until you're ready to paint them up, though I won't fault you. Plastic is a hell of a drug. Perhaps get your fix elsewhere? (Segueing...)

Buy Models From More Eco-Friendly Alternatives

Now, without going into the community outrage with the recent IP Policy changes, maybe a soft-boycott, as generally implied by the previous point, would help the issue. You can keep your HIPS usage down without outright quitting the hobby cold-turkey. 

The 'Orc Forge Lord' from Creature Caster. I honestly love the look of this guy. Maybe it comes from being a Doomfist main back when Overwatch wasn't shit.

Maybe take a break from Games Workshop. There are a handful of third party model-makers, like the folks over at Creature Caster, who make fantastic-quality models that also incorporate recyclable plastics without losing durability or quality. (Not sponsored. Believe me, I wouldn't shut up about it if I was.)

Get Creative

While you're perfectly in your rights to drive down to your local recycling plant and hand over your mound of plastic squares, make sure to check on google if you have one near you that can actually facilitate them. 

Alternatively, you can get Creative! Perhaps your sprues could be utilised as boards and panels for an Orky stronghold to use as terrain (or some particularly cuboid Necrons). The possibilities are endless! Above is a video of Midwinter Minis doing just that!

He looks a bit bashed up now and he was painted over a year ago so he's certainly not the best looking since I've improved greatly since then. Just ignore him and look at the sprue-chunk by his left foot, isn't it pretty?

I, myself, utilised pieces of sprue back when I first assembled and painted my Black Templar Intercessors (See image above) to give the impression of old marble bricks or debris from some ancient pillar. It didn't turn out too great but certainly looks a bit more interesting than an empty base. Perhaps something like that would help you slowly frack Mount Sprue.

Incentivise

Games Workshop needs to do something. Switching to a more eco-friendly plastic is one of the first things I think of. Obviously, just looking at a sprue will show you that there is some semblance of space management and efficiency put into their design. Games Workshop certainly aren't looking to waste plastic. Plastic is money and that brings me to another possible solution which is incentivisation. 

Giving the community a reason to bring back their sprues would help the environment by cutting down on individual trips to the correct recycling plants, as well as the aforementioned landfill and incineration issue. Perhaps offering store credit at a certain £/kg ratio to bring the business back to them would incentivise us to help out the environment, while also bringing business and foot traffic to the numerous Warhammer stores. 

How Can I Help?

Now, while I believe the burden of solution lies on Games Workshop, and I have touched lightly on what you can do above, there are a few things you can do to help right now!

Sign The Petition!

Claret Gurnell set up a Change.org petition to encourage Games Workshop to at least have a think about possible solutions. As of writing this, the solution stands at just under 11 thousand signatures! Joining the swarm will hopefully put a bit of pressure on GW to reconsider their environmental blowback (though they don't seem to be the most receptive of customer feedback right now so probably not...). 

Sign the petition here!

Closing Thoughts

I don't consider myself a particularly environmentally-conscious person but I certainly recognise the benefits of recycling and can't stand when a package arrives or I order takeout and it's covered in sheets and sheets of landfill fodder. While I don't stand to make environmentalism part of this blog or my resumé, I believe that this had to be said. 

That being said, I know it's not the most interesting thing to think about and appreciate your patience if you made it this far. I have a few ideas in the pipeline going forward including a weekly showcase of various homebrew forces in our lovely community, as well as a rework of my Primaris Vanguard Veteran Tutorial as I feel the first one didn't do the process or the models justice. Keep an eye out for that.

Cya later!

Ryan

Fighting Words: A Look at Warhammer 40,000's Crusade Ruleset

Welcome all! I've been talking about this post over on my Instagram and the last Monthly Vox, and I can finally say it's here. Strap in for my "review" of Warhammer 40K's narrative  play mode, 'Crusade.

Note: Going forward, I will be assuming that you are following the Crusade ruleset to the letter. Ultimately, it's your game and if you (and your opponent) are cool with it, you're free to pick and choose. One of Crusade's strengths is it's modularity. I will also be focusing almost-exclusively on the Core Rules Crusade content, and not on any of the Warzones or Campaign books. 

What is Narrative Play?

Similarly to Open Play, Narrative Play normally operates with a different mindset (and often ruleset) to the min-maxed and streamlined playstyles you might see in Matched and Competitive Play. Narrative Play is generally favoured by players that want to tell stories and re-enact their favourite battles from the books and lore. 

Narrative players will frequently have illegal weapon loadouts modelled and statted onto their HQs out of sheer desire for 'Rule of Cool'. While, I generally favour the more structured and... "balanced" systems of Matched Play, it's no difference to me what two consenting adults get up. I don't judge. 

What is Crusade?

Thus is the beauty of 9th Edition's newly(?) introduced Crusade mode, and why I have honestly fallen in love with it. It combines the storytelling and narrative that we associate Warhammer with so strongly, and combines it with (mostly) easy-to-use rules to provide progression and structure for your army. 

In Crusade, two (or more, if you're into that) players get to square off with all manner of narratively-themed missions to help create stories, feuds, vendettas, and cinematic moments. Perhaps your Company Commander gets critically injured in a 1v1 against your friend's Broodlord. The grimdark future offers little time for respite and there's a good chance he'll carry that festering, larvae-filled, wound into his next skirmish. Alternatively, perhaps your Space Marine Lieutenant has earned enough 'Chuck E. Cheese' tokens pimp-slapping Daemon Princes and wants to cash them in for a sweet upgrade to his Wargear. The Crusade ruleset makes this happen.

Forming a Crusade Roster

So you want to jump in? Whoah there, cowboy! First you gotta write up a Roster, known in the Core Rules as your 'Order of Battle'. Most rosters will begin with up to 50 Power Level's worth of units. These units, for the most part, still follow the standard rules described on their datasheets. Be careful however, as even crusade armies are still required to be battle-forged. 

In short, as long as you can build a coherent detachment (almost-always Patrol) from your roster when the time comes, you're free to take whatever units you wish. The main exception to the standard formula here is that you do not assign any Warlord Traits, Relics, or Command Upgrades at this stage of your Crusade. Named Characters and Summons are perfectly allowed, just note that they are unable of using most of the Crusade-specific mechanics found within the ruleset, just something to keep in mind.

As far as the resources available to you, the Core Rulebook contains scannable templates for the sheets used to keep track of your Crusade and it's units. Games Worshop also sell a Crusade "Journal" for the low low price of... £20... Honestly, I highly encourage you get to grips with the Digital Roster set up by that clever fella, Charlie, over at The Beard Bunker. Digital is almost always better and, combined with fitting perfectly on a phone screen, the smart use of spreadsheet formulae means that it automates most of the thinking for you. I can provide a tutorial on how to use this fantastic spreadsheet if it is requested. In the meantime, here's a link to my current crusade roster.

Something to note, all the units you choose must be from one faction. As far as I know, there is no written rules for taking multiple factions in a Crusade roster outside of auxiliary units such as 'Agents of the Imperium'.

Crusade Cards

When a unit is added to your roster, it is assigned a 'Crusade Card'. Crusade Cards are used to keep track of any bookkeeping needed for the unit (upgrades, battles fought, enemies killed, etc) as well as any feats, trivia, and information about it, similarly how it's datasheet might. 

Requisition Points

Requisition Points, or 'RP', are points you accrue over your crusade for meeting various criteria. You gain 1 RP each time you complete a game and extra RP can sometimes be gained as bonus rewards for emerging victorious in certain missions. 

RP's primary purpose is to serve as a currency to spend on 'Requisitions', effectively Strategems that are activated between games. Requisitions are used to heal and repair units that sustain heavy damage, upgrade them how you would Veteran Intercessors or a Tank Commander, or increase the maximum Power Level of your Order of Battle to allow for more unit options. 

You start with 5 RP when you first create your Order of Battle.

Playing the Game

Crusade games follow a similar structure and formula to any other mode of play. Players choose a mission, either by rolling or manually to fit a narrative they had in mind, followed by Agendas that serve as the secondary objectives within the mission type, and then finally deciding their armies by selecting units from their roster to fit the game size. 

Mission Selection

Crusade's missions are probably the most unique thing about the standard gameplay loop, featuring all manner of interesting scenarios ranging from small skirmishes between opposing scouting forces, all the way up to large-scale sieges with odds stacked against one side. Each of these missions has their own actions, modifiers, and twists that make them a blast to play. 

Agendas

Another deviation from the standard formula of Matched Play is that there are no Secondary Objectives, opting to use Agendas instead.Agendas are functionally very similar to Secondaries, often requiring specific conditions or the completion of a specific action to be fulfilled. Perhaps you have your eye on the head of the enemy warlord, or maybe the battlefield is littered with valuable relics ripe for the taking. The narrative can bend to fit you.

However, Agendas operate entirely independently of the mission rules, offering no actual Victory Points and instead rewarding units with sweet sweet XP and progress towards their next upgrade. Like Secondaries, Agendas are split into categories with one Agenda being allowed from each, up to an amount determined by the mission size. 

Crusade Points

Crusade Points are another thing to keep track of. Serving as an army-wide "litmus test" of general Crusade strength. As units improve and upgrade they will be worth more and more Crusade Points. Alternatively, as a unit gets scarred and weakened, they will lose them. This can go into the negative if maths dictates.

At the start of a game, players compared the sum Crusade Points of their chosen units. If one player's chosen units are valued higher than their opponent, their opponent gains bonus Command Points equal to the difference between them halved and rounded up. This serves as a handicap for the player who's crusade might be younger (or unluckier) and, as such, contains less upgraded units. 

Post-battle Bookkeeping

Crusade requires a lot of bookkeeping (again, why automating/digitising the process is a key). After each battle, there's a fair few hoops you need to jump through before you pack up and leave. 

After resolving the mission Victor (and any possible Victor bonuses provided by the mission), give yourself 1 Requisition Point then increase the Combat Tally and Experience points by 1, making sure to also note down any enemies killed or Agendas achieved, as these can also provide Experience points. Finally, choose a unit that you think performed well and grant them one 'Mark of Glory' worth 3 Experience Points. Once you've done this, you're ready for the juicy bit!

Out of Action

If, at the end of the game, any of your units were totally destroyed, roll a D6 for each one. This is called an 'Out of Action' test. If any of your units roll a 1, they are subject to one of the following afflictions:

• Devastating Blow: The unit is unable to gain any Experience Points from the battle. Additionally, they lose D6 Experience Points.
• Battle Scar: Roll on the appropriate 'Battle Scar' table or select a Scar that makes sense for the narrative. Battle Scars are negatives that the unit carries with them until they are removed from the unit at the expense of 1 RP, or the unit is removed from the Order of Battle.

Battle-honours

The cooler big brother of Battle Scars, 'Battle-honours' are upgrades that can be applied to units as they reach certain Experience Point milestones. If any of your units have reached one of these milestones, provide them with one of the following flavours based on table rolls or narrative sense:

• Battle Trait: Normally stat bonuses such as increases to movement speed, extra wounds or attacks, or bonuses to saving throws. These are always nice to have and can put some units in a very good place. WS 2+ Bladeguard anyone?
• Crusade Relic: Powerful artefacts that can be granted Characters. Crusade Relics function independently of standard codex Relics. Any character unit can have any number of different Crusade Relics, but only one of each is allowed per Order of Battle.
• Weapon Enhancement: Similarly to Battle Traits, Weapon Enhancements provide minor stat buffs to a unit, specifically a weapon. Note that Weapon Enhancements are not applied to entire units, only the unit's "Champion". This obviously doesn't really apply to single model units or characters.
• Psychic Fortitude: While generally quite limited, with this table only sporting 3 possible options, Psychic Fortitudes amplify the potential of psykers, allowing them to 1 one to known powers, casts, or psychic tests.

Where Next?

After the battle is fought and the honours/scars have been assigned, you are free to assign your RP however you wish. Perhaps you want to remove a scar that one of your units suffered or change their Wargear to better streamline their killing potential. Maybe you want to swap their psychic powers or add extra models to the unit. This is when to do it. 

Once I've chosen what I'm doing with my crusade and it's units, I tend to write a small narrative summary of the battle's events, normally taking any scars or honours into account to give it a narrative twist. For example, in one of my earlier games, the Marshal of my Black Templars Crusade was obliterated by melta fire and, at the end of the game, suffered a Battle Scar and lost his leg. I gave it the simple narrative spin that his leg was obliterated by the meltas. Simple stuff but it's fun enough.

Obviously you can write entire campaigns if you wish but I tend to do more of a 'turn up and play' style Crusade, then piece together the narrative afterwards. Again, Crusade's main strength is it's versatility and modularity to be whatever you wish.

My Thoughts

Now, while I do enjoy crusade, it is not without issue. For example, the rules were definitely not written with balancing in mind. While obviously this is less of a priority in a narrative context, it means that it becomes very easy to "snowball". Having a few particularly good games in a row will beef up several of your units to god like capacity. I was able to get Marshal Reinhardt to an insane statline (T6, 9W, 0+, 4++,  6+++ (4+++ against MWs) which, in a competitive context is absurd. However in Crusade it is par for the course, while still being utterly batshit. 

Another issue with Crusade, at least the Core Rules, is it's longevity. Without using external source books or making up your own missions from scratch, the missions will begin to grow stale quickly. This is especially true if you do a lot of 25PL-50PL games as you will quickly exhaust your patience with the same 6 missions. However, a bit of creativity and google searching will solve this issue so I suppose this is a nonpoint. 

All in all, I've thoroughly enjoyed my time with the Crusade system so far and it has been an excellent writing aid in coming up with cool situations and narrative ideas for my homebrew Black Templar crusade, while having plenty of fun and getting to roll dice in the process. If you have a few friends and don't mind getting creative with the mission types, you will thoroughly enjoy yourself too!

Conclusion

So this has been a look into the Warhammer 40,000 Core Rules' Crusade system, alongside some of my thoughts and a roughly outline of how it works. I hope you guys have enjoyed reading and let me know if you want me to talk about anything mentioned with a bit more depth. My crusade roster is available to view here if you're interested. 

Cheers and cya!

Ryan

New Black Templar Emperor's Champion Announced!

And so it begins! As we all expected, and as I outlined in last month's post about it over here, the Templars are beginning to get their new models! 

The first of our boys in black to get a fresh coat of paint is the famed Emperor's Champion, sporting all manner of fancy beads and purity seals to show off to all the filthy xenos and heretics-alike.

One of the interesting things to note about this model is it's scale. It doesn't appear to have been 'primaris-ized' as most of us would have guessed. This honestly comes as less of a surprise to me now I think about Castellan Crowe's new model for the Grey Knights, and how he maintained his standard firstborn appearance, albeit with much more primaris-esque proportions. 

It seems as though Games Workshop are in no hurry to rock the boat by putting such iconic characters through a process that a large portion of the community disagrees with in-lore. Of course our new champion comes with the mandatory 'foot-on-rock' treatment we've come to expect. Either way this is purely speculation and, bar the topic of armour I will go into next, we have no way of knowing if this fella is Primaris (or not) until we see his stats and keywords. Onwards!

Another topic of note, it seems, is the armour. This appears to not align with any armour I recognise in the current 40K universe, despite having a very Mk4-looking power pack affixed to his back and sporting the iconic "ball thingies" that the vents are nested into. Does this confirm that the new Emperor's Champion will be firstborn, or is it simply a nod at his heritage? After all, my own converted Emperor's Champion, Reynauld, is very-much Primaris despite having the power pack of the original emperor's champion model. Again, only the datasheet will tell us these things. 

Honestly, I love the look of the new sword and, while it's awkward rotation and the helm's slighly-elevated laurels turn me off slighly (combined with the god-awful positioning of the pistol holster), I am super excited for this models release. On an extra note, to paraphrase Chapter Master Valrak on his YouTube livestream earlier today, "Of the three new character models, the champion is the weakest in terms of looks" which, if anything, lets us know that if this is the low tide mark for our next few releases, we're in for a hell of a christmas!

On top of a sweet new set of models confirmed, we've also effectively had our boxset announced using the new GW pre-order system detailed over on warcom >>>here<<< . Sweet!

Anyway, that's it for now! This was just a short piece I wanted to spam out to celebrate and give some small opinions. Keep your eyes peeled for that post about the Crusade system from the Warhammer 40,000 Core Rules, as well as progress on my own crusade and painting. Have a good day everyone. Cya!

Ryan