Warhammer 40K: 30 Years of Fabius Bile’s Enhanced Warriors
Fabius Bile is ever tinkering with his Enhanced Warriors. With a new CSM codex lurking in 10th’s future, let’s look back at the ups and downs of the good doctor’s work.
Fabius Bile is one of the classic villains of the Grimdark – and a bit of an iconoclast even amongst his Chaos Marine brethren. He’s a man of science you see, still at heart that Chief Apothecary of the Emperor’s Children. Always trying to learn, and eek that extra bit of performance out of his subjects, ahem… patients. His 10,000 year project – The New Man, aka his Enhanced Warriors.
Enhanced Warriors?
We decided to go back across all the editions to map out the mercurial tides of Fabius’ Enhanced Warriors. Their power has indeed waxed and waned over time. But in any case, it will give us a good idea as to twisting path to Bile’s new subfaction – the Creations of Bile, from late 9th Edition. Let’s start way back where it all began, in 1996…
2nd Edition (1996)
The Originals. Up to one squad, with a LOT of enhanced stats, and immune to Psychology. Fabius really knew what he was doing over 2 decades ago.
3rd Edition (1999)
Still one squad only, but this time there is a downside. Each warrior has a 1 in 6 chance of rolling on the “Genetic Corruption” table, and it was pretty bad news. Fabius had reached too far.
3.5 Edition (2002)
Everyone’s favorite CSM codex saw Fabius back on top. Now we can make an entire army of Enhanced Warriors, and the Genetic Corruption table is per squad and quite forgiving. This was an early height of Fabius’ power.
4th Edition (2007)
Fabius can still create an entire army of Enhanced Warriors, but the default ones are slightly different, trading +1 Inititative for Fearless. Clearly the good Doctor was experimenting with his “New Coke” formula.
6th Edition (2012)
Something bad has occurred. Perhaps someone blew up Fabius’ factory, or just plain melancholy, but he’s back to only 1 squad and the Enhanced Warriors are really dull, getting only Fearless and +1 Strength. Clearly, Fabius was depressed and phoning it in in 6th Edition.
8th Edition (2017)
Early 8th Edition Fabius can again make multiple squads, but for the first time, he has to run around, enhancing 1 squad each turn. We are back to the random results table with a chance of casualties. It looks like Fabius has got the factory up and running again, but clearly needs some running shoes to keep up with his unwitting charges. How undignified!
Psychic Awakening (2019)
And here is Fabius at the very tail-end of 8th. First off his one unit per turn stays, but his serum is clearly improved. Now he can affect a unit within 6″, instead of 1″, and only 1 model in the unit can be killed by unfortunate rolls. But of course, this isn’t the main attraction.
The big news is that Fabius’ entire army is now built up around his creations who now benefit from faction special rules, relics, and Stratagems, all of which combine to make some super scary Enhanced warriors.
9th Edition (2022)
Now Fabius gets the super glow-up set of rules with an entire “Creations of Bile” set of Legion rules. Truly Fabius is on a rise, and building off the rules from Psychic Awakening! The entire army now gets the +1″ to Move, and Strength, and can fight after being killed in assault. Plus Fabius can additionally enhance the unit he is currently attached to, as an action with a random effect. It seems the Doctor wants to stay close to see the effects of his experiments these days.
Onto 10th Edition (2024)
We’ll just skip the band-aid indexes, as a new CSM codex is on the way for 2024. I’m sure Fabius is keeping busy.
~ Now think about the next 10th edition CSM codex and what Fabius could do with his Enhanced Warriors! Don’t forget he’s captured some Primaris AND Custodes of late to help with his …research. It’s good to be the Doctor!
