Warhammer 40K: Is It Time To Talk About 10th Edition Yet?

Are we getting close to the end of an edition? Let’s dig in a little deeper to the signs of 40K 10th Edition.

Warhammer 40,000 9 Edition is almost two years old at this point. It’s had a ton of releases and is now a well established edition. It wasn’t the biggest change from the prior 8th Edition rules, but it has made it marks. But it might soon be time to say goodbye to it. Let’s take a look at the signs.

Rumors Abound

As we covered the other day, we are already getting some rumors of 10th Edition. The rumors point towards a new edition sometime in summer or early fall of next year, 2023. They also suggest that a new Marine Codex will be coming out around the same time. The rumors also suggest that Marines (possibly Blood Angels or possibly just generic ones) and Nids will be the focus of the new starter box. So how likely is this to come to pass?

It’s Time For a New Marine Book

The rumors of a new Marine book seem very reasonable to me. While it might seem like Marines have a recent Codex, their book will be two years old this October. We’ve gotten at least one Marine book every 2 years since 6th Edition. 8th Edition of course saw two core Space Marine books drop. The first one stuck around for 2 years, while the second only lasted about a year. (technically it saw three if you count the Index).  Both the 6th Edition and 7th Edition Marine Codices were replaced after about two years.

Given all this it seems pretty reasonable to expect a new Marine book out in late summer or early fall of this year.. This would be perfectly in line with the last decade of Marine books. It wouldn’t even be the fastest a Marine Codex was replaced. If anything NOT getting a new Marine Codex this year would be an outlier. The rumors saying we are waiting till next year for the new book would actually push well past when Marines normally get replaced. It would make the current codex the longest lived in close to a decade. So overall I’d say a new Marine book seem very plausible.

An Old Edition

Much like a new Marine Codex, it would be about time for a new Warhammer 40K Edition next summer. Next summer 9th Edition will be 3 years old. That puts it at about the place editions normally get replaced. 7th and 8th both lasted 3 years. 6th was only around for 2 years. Before that we saw some longer editions, but the last four have all been 3 years or less. In addition we are reaching the end of the Codex cycle. Most of the 8th books have been replaced. The handful that haven’t are coming in the near future. In fact they’ve even had time to slip in a few new armies. Still by next summer the cycle will pretty much be complete. 9th Edition, kicked off by Necrons, with all new Codices and a bunch of supplements will effectively be complete.

Will 10th Edition Be a Big Change?

9th Edition wasn’t a huge change up to the game. 8th was a major shake up, the largest since 3rd Edition back in 1998. 9th, while it made some important changes, was mostly a refining of the 8th formula. So one of the major questions people have is how big of a change will 40K 10th Edition be? Will it be just another minor iteration of 8th, or will it be a big reset. The newer type of rules brought in by 8th have plenty of critics and the game has some major issues over these last few years.

I think the biggest indicator of if 40K 10th Edition will be a major change will be when the next Marine Codex comes out. If the codex, as seems to be rumored, comes out shortly before 10th does, then I would expect small changes to the game. A brand new Codex that works just as well in 9th and 10th Editions argues that they are fundamentally similar games. Stratagems, warlord traits, and no armor value would stick around.

If on the other hand the new Marine book is a purely 10th Edition book  that come out on the heels of the new Edition starter sets opens up the possibility of a lot more changes. While we won’t get any answers for a while, its probably time to start thinking about what we would like to see.

Let us know if you think 10th should be a small or a major change, down in the comments! 

Author: Abe Apfel

Abe is that rare thing, an Austin local born and raised here. Though he keeps on moving around, DC, Japan, ETC., he always seems to find his way back eventually. Abe has decades of experience with a wide range of tabletop and RPG games, from historicals, to Star Wars to D&D and 40K. He has been contributing to BOLS since almost the start, back when he worked at and then owned a local gaming store. He used to be big into the competitive Warhammer tournament scene but age has mellowed him and he now appreciates a good casual match. He currently covers 40K tactics and lore, as well as all things Star Wars, with occasional dabbling in other topics. Abe remains in mourning over the loss of WFB to this day.