Welcome to the first of two posts covering the elite section of the new codex. This section of the book is by far the biggest section and as such has been split up in to two parts. This part will focus on the elite characters, the single model units and the next post will go on to look at the elite squads or multi-model units. So of these single and multi-model units are closely linked and I'll be sure to mention these units when I come to there individual entries. Although thus post will cover just the characters, I will run through them in the order they appear in the codex starting with one of my old favorites, the Master of Ordnance
Master of Ordnance
There have been a few changes to the MoO for the Codex, the big one has been a drop in points, down nearly ten points from the Index. A good points drop for the unit. The other major change has been that the Mater of Ballistics rule has been changed and the range pushed up to 6 inches. This makes it a lot more useful, as it means that you can effect more than just one model without parking everything on top of each other. The drop in points is really the bigger bonus though, as it means that he is now cheap enough that you can slot him in to most armies without worrying about it, although if your using the Cadian Doctrine, he's surplus to requirement, as you wont be moving your artillery much anyway. Personally, I am still not sold on this guy, yes his Artillery Barrage is useful, but not amazing and his ability is useful, but not essential. If I have spare points that I don't know what to do with then I might consider taking one, but other than that I think he's going to be sitting on my shelf for a while.
Platoon Commander
Well, what can be said about the humble platoon commander, Hes obviously a bit forgetful, that's what. Hes managed to mislay his shotgun somewhere and keeps forgetting his chain sword. In other words, he has lost the option to take a shotgun, which isn't really an issue as I don't know anyone who actually took one on a platoon commander and his chain sword is now an option and not part of his basic wargear. Not that that's a problem, just say he has in and if someone complains, point out that every marine carries a bolt pistol and ask them to point it out on there models. As for the platoon commander himself, now he is no longer a required part of the platoon, he has fallen in to a bit of a niche roll. Only being able to issue 1 order means that you'll probably be running him one on one with a squad, rather than using the company commander with a couple of squads. This means that chances are he'll be with a conscript squad, to keep the commissar company, or he'll be with a vet squad, mounted up in a chimera or valkyrie, ready to issue the squad an order. As such a lot of the time, Hes going to be up close with the enemy and so you'll want him as cheap as possible. A niche model with quite a specific role but in the right situation it can be priceless.
Colour Sergeant Kell
The infamous Kell, what can I say, if your running Creed in a fluff list you really have to take Kell anyway. If your running a competitive list then Kell isn't a bad choice, not great but not bad. The reroll for leadership is always good and if your taking Kell, chances are your taking Creed, so that means 4 orders a turn. The bodyguard rules are a bit forceful because if Kell is within range of Creed, you have no choice about rolling against taking a wound on Kell. That means that you'll probably want to keep Kell away from Creed in order to get the rest of his benefits. While Kell adds to the buffs provided by a commander, I don't think that he is a great choice, fluffy and fun but not very competitive. Take him if your taking Creed, he'll be useful, but he's not essential.
Sergeant Harker
Harker is one of the two Catachan characters and remain unchanged from the Index. Harker is a support unit, unlike Straken, although Hes handy enough in a fight. With his reroll for Catachan infantry and his super heavy bolter, you'll be wanting to keep him out of harms way and probably embedded in a conscript blob or in the middle of a group of infantry squads. One of his big advantages is that payback is an assault weapon plus its -2 ap, much better than a syandars heavy bolter or even autocannons. As a support character Hes very useful. But I'm not sure Hes quite good enough.to see him regularly on the tabletop.
Ministorum Priest
Once the mainstay of any guard army, buried deep in one of the 30 or 40 man blob squads of infantry, is now relegated to the side lines, his glory days over. Despite the small drop in power points, the priest is still not worth while taking any more. With the loss of fearless and the ability to combine squads in to large blobs pregame, the abilities of the priest are nothing compared to what they once were. Zealot is still the same, but only affects the priest, no one else and seeing as he cant even take a power weapon, its not really any use. War Hymns now only add one attack to models within 6 inches, that's models and not units, so that's not as good as it once was. All in all its a sad demise of a once great unit and I cant see these guys on the table top any time soon, you'd be better off saving the points for more commissars.
Tech-Priest Enginseer
This unit has both some big wins and some big losses. The unit has dropped in price and is one of the rare units that has dropped both power points (just 1) and match points (down 10). Not only this but the Master of Machines rule has been updated to include Knights. Now it has also lost the Canticles of the Omnissar, but it does gain the <Forge World> key word, so this may make up for the loss, however, as I don't have a AdMech codex to hand and I also don't plan on getting one for two units (this and Servitors), I don't know what the <Forge World> tag actually does. I'm also not going to find out, as I don't plan on running any of these. Why? Well, I don't rate them very highly, as in order to make maximum use of them you either need to group all your armour together or run one for each vehicle. This is fine for LRBT's and artillery, as neither are going to be moving very far or very fast, but everything else, such as Hell Hounds, are going to be moving significantly faster than the Tech Priest. Plus each priest will be repairing on average just 10 wounds a battle, if you use it every turn, so one is not going to stop anything being destroyed, your better off just running Valhallans.
Commissar
The bedrock of any good guard list these days, the good old standard Commissar. The only thing that this model lacks over the other Commissars (Lord and Yarrick) is really just the invulnerable save and a bit of leadership, which doesn't really matter, as you only ever loose one model anyway. These are almost auto include options these days, especially if your thinking about taking conscripts. The only reasons I can see for taking one of the other commissars is if you want fluff with Yarrick because you'll be facing Orks, or because you have run out of Elite slots and still need a Commissar. For cost and effectiveness, this is by far the best option.
Edit: I wrote this before the new FAQ came out yesterday and there have been some major changes to commissars, changes that I am not sure are a good thing yet. Commissars now no longer grant an automatic pass to moral with the loss of a squad member (for a failed test), just a re-roll while still loosing a squad member. This means that you could end up loosing a lot of men for failing a test by just one, as you would have failed, lost a man and then have to reroll, with the possibility of loosing more men. This seems to be a move to satisfy tournament players who are complaining that enough wasn't done about conscripts and I think is detrimental to many non tournament players.
Officer of the Fleet
The Officer of the Fleet is another model that I struggle with, in the same way that I struggle with the MoO. Why he has useful abilities, his Air Raid Request is very similar to the MoO's Artillery Barrage and is quite useful, and Strafing Run, which got some clarification that it only applies to Valkyries, is better now that MRP's are assault weapons. However, I just don't think that he is particularly useful overall, yes, if I have spare points I would probably take one, but would I change a list to free up points to take him, no, I wouldn't. Maybe I'll have to play him a few time with my Valkyries and see if it really does make a difference or not.
Astropath
The Astropath remains unchanged and still dirt cheap. Now some people initially said that this was great and that you could spam them for Smite, but in reality it doesn't work that way, as you can only roll 1D6, and you'll only cast a third of the time. So you'll not be spamming smite at all. The other ability is basically casting Ignore Cover to units on to a single enemy unit. Good if you want to dig something out of cover but at only 18 inches, the range is short and not useful for what you really want, blasting something to smithereens with your lascannons from the other side of the table. No, Astropaths are cheap for a reason, there not very good.
Ogryn Bodyguard
Now, in contrast to Astropaths, we have a unit that is good. This is basically a generic Nork Deddog. I love the idea of this unit and plan of sticking a box of Ogryns on my Christmas wish list this year. The units is tough and has lost of options, more than the standard Ogryns. I plan on running three with different setups. The only downside to the unit is the bodyguard rule, as it does not give you the option to transfer a wound or not, if your in range you have to roll the dice. While it makes sense, I would probably keep the bodyguard out of range for the start as you want to keep him around and not loose him straight out the bag to shooting. Granted, with the current rules, this is unlikely, as the number of weapon that can snipe characters is quite low, but ideally this unit is a counter charge and anti-deep strike unit. With a good line of stats, piling these guys in to any back field deep strikers will cause problems for said units. I will be running these guys, at least one per army, to accompany my warlord.
Nork Deddog
The original Ogryn Bodyguard has lost nothing with the addition of the generic unit, he costs a little more but has better stats and abilities. Personally, I don't like Nork, as I don't like the load out for a Bodyguard, I would prefer the option to take a shield of some sort, not that that would help with the bodyguard rules, but when throwing him in to combat it would help. For the extra points I don't think he is worth it and would take the generic ones, but having said that, his abilities are good and he is not a bad choice if you like the war gear load he carries. Definitely worth considering.
So that's all the Elite Character Models done, and there are a mix of useful units, (Ogryn Bodyguards, Commissar, Platoon Commander) and some not so good units (Astropath, Tech-Priest) and a bunch somewhere inbetween. The pick of the bunch has to be the Commissars, who will or should be in every guard army, with the Platoon commander coming in second, as he has a much more niche role. As to the likes of the MoO and OotF, well, as far as i'm concerned the jury is still out on them, they may prove very useful, or they may sit on the shelf gathering dust for a while, but one thing is certain, at least the Astropath will have some company on the shelf.
Next up are Elite Squads.
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