Warhammer 40K: Beyond The Veil & Tactical Deployment – A Look Inside
Two new supplements are coming to Warhammer 40,000 with Beyond the Veil and Tactical Deployment. Let’s take a quick tour -with a warning.
We were excited about these supplements because Crusade is an interesting way to play and more Terrain Rules seems interesting. Plus, all the missions genuinely seem like a good thing for the game – more missions means less repetitive games. So how did GW do with these productions? Let’s take a look.
Beyond The Veil
This book was actually quite surprising. It’s got a ton of useful missions – regardless if you’re playing Crusade games or not – that you can use to put a narrative spin on things. Plus it’s got a ton of new Crusade specific rules included inside the covers, too. If this was a D&D supplement, this would effectively be a campaign guide book. There are new rules, battle scars, relics and more. It’s all the things you’d want if you were playing a Crusade in the Pariah Nexus.
Also, I just want to say that I do appreciate the formatting for both of these books. Not only do they have full Canadian wiro ring-binding which makes them stay open to the page you need at the back of the book is the core rules, too. With the fantastic glossary! So if a rules question pops up mid game, no need to dig through your BRB – just flip the book to the back and use the glossary. Again, this applies to BOTH books. It’s the little things that add a lot to the QoL of using these products. Well done, GW.
Crusade Mission Pack: Beyond the Veil $40
Tactical Deployment
Okay, time for some tough love. This book was…a little disappointing. Why? Well, it’s still got a ton of missions in there – 18 divided between the 4 different game sizes. A Tactical Terrain Roster and even a scoring sheet if you want to run or play in a Tactical Deployment tournament. And of course it’s got the core rules for using Tactical Terrain. However, it’s got one big glaring issue: The specific terrain rules aren’t there.
“Wait, what does that even mean?” Simply put, this book is *really* usable without the cards. What cards? The new Terrain Datasheet Cards:
You need these cards to use the rules in the book. The Tactical Deployment has no rules for the physical terrain between the covers. These cards aren’t bonus extras that you can use as a “quick reference” these cards are literally the only way to get the terrain rules needed to play with Tactical Deployment.
We were really hoping to see more from this book. Like having these datasheets inside for one. We were also hoping to see rules for custom terrain or create-your-own options. Unfortunately those things were not inside.
Honestly, this one seems like a pretty hard sell to many veteran players out there. If you already have a terrain collection, these new Datasheets don’t have rules for your current terrain. This is a solution GW could fix by creating and releasing Terrain Datasheets for some of the previous sets.
GW, you made the kits and rules – just reformat them for Tactical Deployment.
If you’re new and looking to expand into Terrain collecting then these rules are kinda neat for you. I could see this working great for a local league or store-run league as well. Folks are going to need to buy terrain to play with these rules and an escalation league or Crusade League that uses these rules seems like a good fit.
Chapter Approved Mission Pack: Tactical Deployment $40
Both of these products are coming to stores this weekend. If I had to pick one, I’d go with Beyond the Veil. If I wanted to dabble with the new terrain kits coming and the Tactical Deployment rules, I’d be SURE to get the Terrain Datasheet – otherwise, you’ve got an incomplete product.
You’re gonna need the cards.
