Warhammer 40K: 10th Edition – Characters Are Joining Squads Once Again
It appears that Characters are going to get to join up with Squads in Warhammer 40,000: 10th Edition. The bodyguard/retinue returns!
Games Workshop is bringing an old school features from Warhammer’s past back to 10th edition with the updates to Character rules. This version is slightly different than from previous editions and sound like it could be interesting. How does it work? Let’s dig in to find out exactly how your Characters are going to lead their squads.
“The new edition of Warhammer 40,000 is bringing some pretty massive changes to the rules. One of the most eye-catching is the way that CHARACTERS now interact with their subordinates. The powerful Aura bonuses that they used to impart on all nearby troops are gone – in almost all cases. These effects were powerful, but the potential to stack them up made balancing the game tricky.
So now, rather than handing out re-rolls to anyone in earshot, your heroes now join a single squad and act as one cohesive unit. It’s an elegant system that helps keep over-buffed super-units at bay.”
Characters and Squads
Looking at the example Primaris Lieutenant we have a new Leader ability. This is the key that allows a character to join a squad and happens before deployment — during the same time as transports would be allocated to a unit. The other kicker here is that the leader becomes a permanent member of that unit for the whole battle!
Additionally, as mentioned above, auras have been changed in “almost all cases” and now will apply to the unit the Characters are leading. In the Lieutenant’s case this will apply two abilities to the unit he’s in. The first is Tactical Precision which gives the unit the Lethal Hits. This is the new name for the “auto wound on unmodified 6s to-hit” rule.
Secondly the Lieutenant also allows them to shoot and still charge in a turn where they Fell Back thanks to the Target Priority rule.
Another change here is that Leaders can only join specific units. These units will be listed like the chart above. Also note that a Lieutenant can join a squad that already has a Captain or Chapter Master attached to it. That’s an interesting side note and has the potential to create a pretty buff unit depending on all the rules this provides. It’s also worth noting that if the rest of the unit is destroyed the two characters (the Lt. and Captain) will separate and form their own units at their original Starting Strengths. I am curious as to what that means in terms of any remaining damage…but I’m sure that’s addressed elsewhere.
The Lieutenant isn’t the only character that can join a unit with an existing Character either. There’s other units mentioned like the Biophagus from Genestealer Cults or Warlocks from Aeldari Craftworlds.
“The old Look Out, Sir! rule has also been devolved into this new system. Your Leader is kept safe by their Bodyguards, and can usually be targeted only when everyone else in the squad has breathed their last. “
There is another type of character that cannot join units. These are called Lone Operatives and function more independently than the squad joining types. They still have other defensive benefits so they can’t be picked-off quite so easily (although there are rules to bypass that). Lone Operative allows those units to be untargetable by ranged attacks unless the attacker is within 12″ of them.
Now, some of these characters only get the Lone Operative benefits while they are near other units. Iron Father Feirros was called out specifically in that he only gets that benefit if he’s close to an allied Vehicle. Lion El’Jonson will also get a similar treatment if he’s near a unit of allied Adeptus Astartes Infantry. As such, these heroes might have rules that are closer to the current aura-type buffs for those units.
One final thing that GW pointed out was all these changes are specifically designed to make things tougher in the new edition. We’ll have to see just how tough later as they are teasing some big changes to tanks and skimmers coming soon. More on that later!
What do you think of these Characters leading units now? What characters are you hoping to run with bodyguards in the next edition?
