40K: Start Playing 8th Today
The Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition Pre-Orders are up – that means it’s time to grab a demo!
The day is finally here – 40k 8th pre-orders are live which means at your local GW store or FLGS! They probably have a demo copy out and available for you to look at…
Regardless of the demo models, you can still play a game using your current army – it’s just going to take some tweaks and we are here to talk you through it. But first things first: Rules.
Find this fold-out. It’s 8 pages total. Those are the core rules for the entire game of 40k. Read them, memorize them, love them – whatever. Just keep them handy for your first game! You can also track down a copy of the Big Rule Book:
The BRB is a really nice 280 hardback. I believe the actual rules start around page 168. Guess what, they are the same 8 page of rules from the 8 page fold-out. Beyond that, you’ll see things like examples, missions, and how to build you army. I’m getting ahead of myself – but really, if you’re going to play your first game, I’d recommend starting with something relatively simple. Build a 1000 point Battleforged list. But to do that, you’ll need one of these:
Find the appropriate book for your army and put together your list. For your first game try something simple like a Patrol Detachment:
You should be able to easily fit a 1000 points in this. Because it’s a Battleforged army, you’ll have 3 Command Points – remember that for later!
When you’re building your army please keep this in mind:
The base point cost does NOT include any wargear. You have to manually add that back in.
So if you take a Space Marine, don’t forget to add in the Bolter, Bolt Pistol, Frag & Krak grenades… Oh, and every model is assumed to have a close combat weapon. Keep that in mind, too – if for some reason you take a Carnifex with double-sets of Devourers, they still have a “basic” attack value using their stat line. Not that we did that or anything (I totally did that). It’s in the core rules under Close Combat.
The points are going to be in the back of the book – near their army wargear section. It’s a little time consuming to go back and forth when list building. The good news is you only have to pay for the options you take and not the options you replace!
Conversely, you could also try to do a quick build using the Power Level option. In case you’re wondering for a smaller game we recommend around 50 Power Level Points. We noticed that most 1000 armies we threw together using the Patrol Detachment were usually within 10 or so power level points of that. And for the sake of fun, compare your Power Levels to your opponent:
- 1-10 difference = No bonus.
- 11-20 difference = The army with the lower points gets +1 Command Point.
- 21+ difference = Check your math. Seriously. If you still have that big of a gap, +3 Command Points to the army with the lower Power Level.
Great – now you’ve got your rules, your army, and hopefully someone to play against. For a 50ish Power Level/1000 point game you only need a 4×4 table. Now just grab some terrain (rules for that are in the BRB in the Advanced Rules section) and you’re good to go!
Fun things to try:
- Shoot one unit, charge another
- Consolidate from one combat to another
- “Pull” in an enemy unit that thought it wasn’t going to have to fight this turn
- Interrupt your opponent’s chargers by spending 2 Command Points to activate a unit to fight first – do remember that at least one charging unit still gets to swing first…
- Remember Morale Test
- Cast Smite with a Psyker or attempt to block an enemy from casting
- Advance during the movement phase… and shoot with Assault Weapons!
- Advance during the movement phase… and charge with Genestealers!
- Weep with joy when The Tygon tunnel works like it should have for the past, what, 7 years?
Okay – those last two were for me. I dusted off my Tyranids and they worked surprisingly well! And that’s my last bit of advice: Try old units out. The game is different and units that you may have skipped might not be so terrible now. Conversely, auto-include units might not be “the best” option any more – in fact a lot of the options are all viable in the right circumstance.
So contact your FLGS or local GW store – ask them if they have the books available to look at. If they do, call a buddy and setup some game time and go play 8th. Give it a shot…who knows, you might actually have fun again.
The BoLS Crew is diving in to 8th this weekend – see you on the other side!
