Thursday 20 October 2022

Guard leaks - psychic, relics and warlords

After looking at the regimental doctrines, we are looking at the psychic powers, warlord traits and then relics. We will dive in to psychic powers first:


Psychic Powers

TERRIFYING VISIONS - Malediction: warp charge 6. select one enemy unit within 18" Until the start of your next Command phase Subtract 2 from the Leadership + Your opponent cannot select that unit for the Insane Bravery Stratagem and no re-roll for Morale. Also roll 2D6 and if beat the enemy Ld they fail any actions they were doing

This could be good for removing an enemy objective secured unit from an objective with the added benefit of possibly failing an action, although on just 2d6, this is not very likely. 

GAZE OF THE EMPEROR - Witchfire: warp charge 6. select one enemy model within 12" of and visible. Draw a straight line between any part of that model's base and PsYKER's base. Roll one D6 for that enemy model's unit, and one D6 for each other unit that this line passes over: on a 1-5, the unit being rolled for suffers 1 mortal wound; on a 6, the unit being rolled for suffers D3 mortal wounds,

This might be good for dealing a few mortal wounds but really it's not going to be great, especially with just a 12 inch range. This could be useful as a last resort but not worth taking in general.

PSYCHIC BARRIER – Blessing: warp charge 6. select one friendly ASTRA MILITARUM unit within 12" of this PSYKER. models in that unit have a 5+ invulnerable save.

Like the previous incarnation this is a good power, being able to put an invulnerable save on a unit is always going to be good.

NIGHTSHROUD - Blessing: warp charge 6. select one friendly ASTRA MILITARUM unit within 12" of this PSYKER. That unit gains transhuman

Transhuman is getting to be pretty wide spread these days and while my first though was that this was pretty useless, actually I think it could be quite good, especially on infantry. Most weapons will be wounding on 3's usually, with quite a few on 2's. Bumping this up to a 4 will actually keep a few more guardsmen around, especially if you can get Psychic Barrier off as well!

MENTAL SHACKLES - Malediction: warp charge 6. select one enemy unit within 18" of this PsYKER. -2" from the Move and -2 from Advance and charge rolls

This could be quite useful when put on to a combat oriented unit, such as blade guard or wytches. Reducing the max move and charge from 18 to 14 and average from 13 to 9 is a big difference. This could be quite useful on a PSYKER your planning on pushing up the table.

PSYCHIC MAELSTROM - Witchfire: warp charge 6. roll a number of D6 equal to the result of the Psychic test. for each 5+, the closest enemy within 18" + visible suffers 1 mortal wound (max 6).

This could be very swingy, as you could do 6 mortal wounds or none. Personally I don't think it's worth taking as there are better power in this list.

So psychic power are pretty much at the same.level.they were before, there are a couple of good ones, a couple of ok ones and a couple of weaker ones, and again it's the defensive powers that look strongest.

As for warlord traits we have 6 listed and there doesn't appear to be any army specific ones, the same as for all the other things listed here. I would be surprised if we dont get some sort of army specific things for Cadian, Catachan and death corps at least. The first thing to note with the warlord traits is that if your chosen warlord does not have the officer keyword, it must take the Frontline Combatants trait.

FRONT-LINE COMBATANT - melee attack: exploding 6s and +1 to wound

I think that this is not a very useful trait. To make the most of it you need to tool the warlord up for close combat and guardsmen tend not to make very good combat monsters. Most of the time i think you'll be taking an officer anyway, so can't see this getting much use at all.

MASTER TACTICIAN – 3 unit redeploy and can go in strat reserves

This can be very useful, redeploying units can be very helpful and can really throw an opponent's plans off. Definitely a good option but is a one shot deal, meaning you don't gain anything after the pregame moves.

GRAND STRATEGIST – CP refund on a 5+ (per CP spent)

In a meta where CP's are so restrictive, getting extra CP can be very powerful. You'll get about 2 CP a game back when starting with 6 CP but you may get more or sometimes less. Very swingy but great when it works. 

SUPERIOR TACTICAL TRAINING – Select one type of order the model doesn’t know, it now knows them. E.g. officers can do commissar orders

This could be very useful now that orders seem to be split up so much (I'll go over orders in another post). This is one 9f the few that gives you guaranteed options during the whole game, as long as your warlord is alive.

OLD GRUDGES – select enemy unit pregame. Units with 6 inch of warlord have +1 to wound against that unit

Another good trait and very useful for taking down that must kill unit. However, like a lot of these traits, once that unit is dead, the usefulness of the trait disappears. Still one to consider but not the best.

LEAD BY EXAMPLE - can issue Orders to its own unit, even though you cannot normally select OFFICER.

This could be useful but a lot depends upon what the officers or command squads are capable of doing. If you can tool them up with special weapons  or if you have a specific role in mind for the squad than this could be useful, otherwise I think there may be little utility in this one.

So as usual with the various guard options, there seems a couple of good options, a couple of ok options and a couple of weaker options. Really I think that only Frontline Combatant is a really terrible option, all the others have a use, which you choose will partly depend on other rules we have yet to see. 

Lastly we have the relics, the biggest section here with a massive 8 options. Some names are familiar but most have changed how they work.

THE EMPEROR'S BENEDICTION – range 18 Pistol 3 S4 AP1 D2 Abilities: ignore the Look Out, Sir rule. unmodified wound roll of 6 does 1 mortal wound in addition

I'm guessing that this replaces a bolt pistol rather than a laspistol but even so, it's not a great option. Yes the buffs are decent but ap1 won't do much to most characters and 3 shots at D2 won't kill many even if they all hit.

TACTICAL AUTO-RELIQUARY OF TYBERIUS- issue +1 order

Extra orders are always good and with the command squads going down to just one order a turn, adding an extra order in is alway going to be useful. I can see this option being taken quite a bit.

DEATH MASK OF OLLANIUS – bearer + their unit gets a 4++

A 4+ invulnerable save is always good, especially as most characters will likely have a 5+ save and with all the ap around an invulnerable save is now even more important.

THE BARBICANT'S KEY Grand – Dark matter crystal/viel of shadows equivalent (e.g. pick up and put down same turn)

The option to move a unit around the board is very powerful, however, it seems that there is quite a bit we don't know. If this can be used on any units, then it's very good, if it's only on infantry it's not quite as good. Either way, it's a good choice.

KUROV'S AQUILA – Vect equivalent (e.g., 1 enemy strat costs 1 more CP for the game)

Again, another good relic. In a game with limited CP, upping the cost of a strat at a critical time in the game or even forcing an opponent not to use a stratagem is alway useful. 

GATEKEEPER 72” rang.: Blast. Turret Weapon. Heavy D3+6 str 9 ap-3 D3

While this looks like a good option, as we don't know the standard profile for a battle cannon, we don't know how much of an improvement it is. At a guess it will have more shots, better strength and better ap. If your going heavy on armour this could be a good option for a bit of extra fire power.

RELIC OF LOST Cadia- Cadian only. Once per battle. (Aura): CADIAN INPANTRY in range get +1 WS and BS and attacks and Ld

The first of the restricted options we've seen and while it carries a good number of bonuses, it could be very restrictive. Unless you build completely around Cadian units, this will have limited use.

ORDER OF THE BASTIUM STELLARIS – Transhuman for bearer and unit

 We have another transhuman option. This will be taken on command squads, especially if your warlord is contain within it. A good option for keeping your command squad and warlord alive.

PSY-SIGIL OF SANCTION Psyker model only know +1 power, cast +1 power

While being able to cast an addition power can be useful, guard psykers are not exactly power houses on the field. This could be useful but on the whole, I don't think this is going to be much use. 

ARMOUR OF GRAF TOSCHENKO bearer gets 2+ save and +1 wound

This relic goes up against the death mask and I would rather have a 4+ invulnerable rather than a 2+ save. The extra wound could be useful but with all the ap around I still think the death mask is a better option. 

LAURELS OF COMMAND Can issue one order (from a specific subset, not all orders) in the enemy turn. Once per game 

This could be very good or completely useless, it's very hard to know without knowing what orders are included. I suspect it's ones like fix bayonets and take cover. Hard to judge right now but I still think it will be of limited use.

As always, there are some standout options here and some not so good options. My pick here are probably the death mask and armour, but we will have to see what the rest of the rules are like before deciding.

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