9 things we know about 40K 9th Edition Part 1: Rules polish Explained!

I believe there's a terrible affliction that strikes any 40K player/creator that leads them towards terrible puns. That's also a heck of a title to say in one go.

Image yoikned from Spiky Bits, which they yoinked from Warhammer Community

Hello chaps and chapettes, we're back in the classroom to look at the slight glimpses into what 9th Edition has to offer. James Workshop, the great figurehead of our favourite plastic addiction, talks about the 9 updates we can expect for 9th Edition, which you will probably read about 9 times.

As an aside, I genuinely think Games Workshop missed a trick here by having the Necrons as the big bad guy. I spoke about some tin foil hattery as to why, the entire argument boiling down to marketing symmetry, but it really should have been a Tzeentchian update. His number is 9, and it would have made some cool sense to have Thousand Sons being the bad guys in the Starter box set (wrestling control from Nurgle). 

However, it may well be that Tzeentch's plans run deeper than just gaining control of the box set, and his machinations are already at play in this edition's development cycle.

Just as planned.

But this isn't just a divergent ramble about nerdy lore to pad out the writing time of this article. No, this is the awesome segue into what the first tip off is all about; 9th Edition is going to be about rules polish.

Tzeentch is the god of creation, more or less, but not really thoughtful creation. More spontaneous, and random, perhaps part of some larger scheme, but not controlled. Whilst we do say he is the god of fate, and his plans are legendarily long term and convoluted, he is still a god of Chaos, and that means the things he creates are Chaotic.

If you've ever been a part of an organisation (or school) which churns out new policies non-stop, without regard to existing procedures or even necessity of making the policy, you can see his handiwork. There will undoubtedly be many good reasons for the creation of these policies, and they will possibly be part of some larger design for the company (or school), but they will be abandoned, forgotten about and or undefined.

Speaking from personal experience where I've seen this happen in front of me (in a school funnily enough), there's nothing more demoralising than when management can't stick to a single decision or path. 

Enter 9th Edition, and the rules creep of 8th Edition.

8th Edition opened with some severe streamlining of the rules. The old Weapon Skill and Ballistic Skill look up tables were abandoned, and the comparison tables between Strength and Toughness were dropped as well. The AP system shifted from being an "ignore armour saves higher than this number" to being modifiers which could be applied on the fly.

For those whose neck beard is only just beginning to fuzz, back in the day we had BS 1 through 9, where BS 6 and above started giving you re-rolls to hit. Strength and toughness comparisons had charts which somewhat arbitrarily decided whether or not you would get a 4+ or a 5+ to wound, and if the target was high enough toughness you just couldn't wound at all. Vehicles also had their own mechanics, which meant the majority of weapons couldn't touch them at all.

This was why Necron warriors and Fire Warriors were seen as amazing troops... they were one of the few Troops who could glance Land Raiders to death, and this was back when vehicles only had 4 wounds.

But 8th Edition is older now, and the streamlining that took place after 7th has now been overlaid with rules creep. 

The best case of this I can give is the Space Marines themselves. 

On the surface, they're an easy to understand bunch; Str/T 4, 3+ armour save, Str 4 guns, and decent leadership. The standard Marine has been this since 3rd Edition (I think!).

But as a snap shot right now they have the following extra:

• They shall know no fear, re-rolling Morale tests
• Combat Doctrines
• Shock assault
• Chapter Tactics
• Chapter Doctrines
• Stratagems
• A variety of aura buffs
• A variety of deep strike options for the Troops alone

Not an insurmountable amount of rules to know, but remember that the Tactics and Chapter Doctrines can wildly change how these models interact with others... and that's just the basic Troops.

This is not a bad thing; more rules means more depth to a game, which means much more unpredictability in any single engagement, and therefore more fun. Every now and then you do need to clean the fluff out and drop some of the more silly rulings and set in stone the really good ones. 

So what can we expect in terms of polish?

Well, fully explained edge cases, such as when modifiers are applied to dice rolls and the weird interactions that take place there. For example:

• You have a gun which allows you to re-roll failed To Hit rolls
• You have WS 3+
• You roll a 3
• The enemy has a - 1 To Hit modifier

Now you miss the target certainly, but if the modifier is applied before the roll then that 3 counts as having failed to hit, so you get your re-roll. If the modifier is applied after the roll, well the attack roll didn't fail, it was only adjusted after the fact.

If that makes you head hurt, bear in mind this has been a point of contention with many players in the past, leading to the wording changing in newer rules to "re-rolling all To Hit rolls" as opposed to "failed Hit rolls". 

This is what you can expect to see tidied up, along with maybe some of the goofier rules dropping out (like the stratagem when a Whirlwind gets to re-roll hits if it's in line of sight of a Land Speeder).

Who will be the big winners and losers here? Depends on the way the wind is blowing really. I heard a rumour that modifiers will be capped at -1 in most cases. I can argue this being good for a lot of models, and just a pain for some (like you Eldar flyers). The idea would be to stop the whole un-targetable model problem, which isn't fun for anyone. 

I would have gone down the line of making all 6s an automatic hit myself, because I can see a case where Intercessors are going to be moving with a Heavy weapon, shooting at an Alaitoc Ranger whilst they are Concealed, and still going to hit half the time.

But we'll need to wait and see what drips through the rumour mill to decide is anything s game changing. 

Right, I need to make a test now. On your way out Subscribe to the blog, or leave a comment below saying if you liked the post or not, or just to tell me I'm wrong. I respond to nearly all comments!

Until next time!

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