Warhammer 40K: What The New Guard Rumors Say About Their Upcoming Codex
Astra Militarum are getting a new Codex, eventually. Let’s make some educated guesses about what it’s going to be like.
Astra Militarum are going to get a new Codex sometime before 10th Edition arrives. It’s already been teased and we know a few new units are coming. Besides that we’ve just got rumors to go by. This week we’ve gotten a whole new raft of rumors about the upcoming book. Let’s take a look at them and what they might mean.
Rumor 1
“Veteran Squads and Special Weapon squads are gone from the book, and Infantry squads lose access to heavy weapons, but gain a second special weapon slot.”
This one sounds like some house keeping in the book. In essence these are units that GW doesn’t sell specific models for that could be going away. In addition Infantry Squads losing heavy weapons would make the unit more closely reflect what you get in the box. While I could see this happen due to GW wanting boxes to match units I know a lot of people will be sad. These are units and options with a long history, basically the entire game.
Rumor 2
- You won’t be running pure Cadians (of course you could) You will be able to mix and match different regiments into one force.
- Your army bonus doesn’t care that half is Catachan and the other Krieg, you’ll still get your army rule.
- The only benefit in running say a unit of Catachan is to use a strat like “vicious traps”.
This is a really odd rumor. It feels like if its true they Guard would working differently than any other book. They would essentially be getting ride of sub-faction rules or doctrines. Something every other army has. It sounds like doing this would get rid of any real distinction between Regiments. I mean… just getting some kind of minor boost on stats is pretty lame.
On the other hand maybe instead of Doctrine rules, you’ll just get the Regimental Special Orders. Then also you’ll get strats, WL traits, etc.. I suppose that could be enough to make them interesting? I just don’t know why the Imperial Guard designers would take such a radical approach to Sub-factions.
Rumor 3
In enemy charge phase spend X cp When a unit is charged and is in terrain, roll a d6 +1 if unit is Catachan or guerrillas +1 if unit has a melta mine +1 if Sly Marbo is on the battlefield
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- On a 2-5 the enemy unit suffers d3 mortal wounds, on a 6+ the enemy unit suffers 2d3 mortal wounds
This sounds like a new stratagem. Or a new version of an existing one. And sure? I guess. It seems very complicated with a lot of different modifiers. It’s a bit odd to call out Sly Marbo as giving your whole army a buff. If this is ALL you get for being Catachan… then thats not really cool. this is one that feels like we are only getting part of the picture.
Rumor 4
The command squad is now the hq. You don’t get individual characters leading.
Yes. Now this is a rumor I can totally get behind. This is a return to the classic way Guard work. For codex after codex the Guard HQ came with their whole Command Squad. The last few editions, due to how 8th and 9th worked split officers out of the Command Squads. This essentially made Command Squads worthless and broken. Combining them once again would be a great move and open up a lot of great options.
Rumor 5
- Field Ordinance Battery Choices
- Bombast field gun
- Heavy lascannon
- Malleus rocket launcher
This rumor makes it look like we are getting some sort of new artillery unit with 3 options to chose from. It sounds like this is something bridging the gap between the Heavy Weapons Squads and the Basilisk type heavy artillery. I’m guessing that this is going to be a non-vehicle heavy unit. In essence replacing the old Forgeworld Basilisk platforms, or Thudgun variants. I’m all for Guard having more big guns.
Rumor 6
“Scions range is now 24″ get the regiments bonus and also 6’s to hit score additional hits”
I’m guessing this means that the hot-shot lasguns are going from a 18″ range to a 24″ range. I’m not super a fan of that to be honest. I like that the hot-shot feels different with a benefit and a downside. I assume that Scions getting the regiment’s bonus is simple because regiments don’t really exist any more. If your whole army gets the bonus it makes sense Scions would get it also. It seems 6’s to hit scoring additional hits will just be a Scion sub-rule, not a sub-faction rule. This makes sense if they want to bring back Kasarkins and have them be part of a Cadian force. This seems like a return to how they used to work back in the day.
Let us know what you think about these rumors, down in the comments!
