Read it from my lips, people, BL is and was always intended to be an Ini 1+ army. The hatred rules were purely for fluff reasons, never to lead to an effective Ini other than 1+, except under the rare circumstances when the BL player insisted on mixing factions and allowed them to come close to each other.

Any attempts to read soemthing else into the hatred ruling are sorely misguided.

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Be careful what you say Irondeath - We are making enquiry.

Any attempt to read anything into anything is perfectly valid, so long as is reasoned, debated and tested fairly before any definitive statements are made. Perhaps all this is old and settled news to you Chaos experts, but to some it is otherwise.

One fluff question remaining. Why does an army need a Warlord. Why must a warlord be present in every BL army? Imperial Guard, Space Marines, Eldar do not have to have SC's. What, fluff wise, happens if the warlord is not present?

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Sorry, having 'fonger' trouble   I have also edited my earlier post to distinguish between CSM 'Lord', 'Warlord' and the point about the basic initiative.


While the SM are "the universe finest" etc, I thought that CSM were slightly inferior to them, which is why they don't have TSKNF and need the 'Lord' to meld them into a single formation and the 'Warlord' to run the army - at least that is the gist of what has been posted recently in justification for the formation costs including the relevant 'Lord'. So, my proposal is designed to bring out that particular element in the game by recognising the degree to which the 'Lord' character influences the formation he is in, increasing the formation discipline and responsiveness up to that of the SMs.

You could increase this effect to allow him to influence formations within a set distance but that rapidly becomes messy with all the measuring and multiple lords etc, whereas this is very easy to determine and use (is the relevant unit present - then formation initiative 1+).

WE can be stated as having a basic initiative of 1+, and you can determine which other formations would get a 'Lord' character upgrade (so I would suggest that perhaps the Forlorn Hope would not, though YVMD).

Incidentally, this would actually bring the armoured company back in line with the SM because they do not currently get a 'Lord' character in their makeup which seems a little odd - now they could have the option of buying one for 30 points, which seems a bargain to me.

As for another 'special rule', this is applied to the unit notes for the CSM 'Lord' so the scope of the rule is actually very limited and IMO justifiable.

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Here, I beg to differ PG, see my response to LI above

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Why? It was effectively 1+ with the old rules and was built on the assumption that the base initiative was 1+.

Sorry but this has been reiterated time and time ago over the course of a few years so I'm actually rather confused why we're even having this discussion.

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[QUOTE]Sorry but this has been reiterated time and time ago over the course of a few years so I'm actually rather confused why we're even having this discussion.

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Yes, daemons with ini 1+.

To quote myself:

Ini 2+ will lead to BL formations failing engage actions all the time (a BM is granted when you are that close to the enemy, so you have to roll 3+, 4+ on the retain).

Ini 2+ is the reason why I have given up on kitting my LatD armies for assaults, they fail constantly, usually hideously exposed out of cover and close to the enemy.

If you want to ruin the list, that´s the way to do it.

IG can cope much better with failed action tests since they can Hold and the shoot to good effect, BL can´t.

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The topic needs less drama not more.

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Guns don't break formations. Blast Markers break formations.

I think this brings us back to the same sort of deal as the factions. It might be fluffy, but it's ultimately rather unnecessary and easily forgotten.

Can everyone please try to keep on topic and not post inflammatory comments.

You are right. There was no drama before (dunno why you thought there was) but I do not need to introduce dramatic language into the debate. However, dramatic or no, my points are still valid.

No one here has to discuss this stuff just because Ginger, I, and others decide to do so. The matter may be decided by you but not yet by us. I do respect good reasoning of course, especially Irondeath's.

Irondeath: There are too sides to this debate on initiative. One is fluff one is balance. I have suggested that the fluff calls for an effective initiative of more than 1+, especially when there's no warlord. You have stated that 1+ is necessary for balance reasons because, like the space marines, the BL is not a shooty army. This logic must therefore extend to all non shooty armies such as Space Marines. Seriously, I give this a lot of credence. However, as I've already said I'd rather test this idea rather than take someone's word for it if I can.

I might like to propose to Gavin number of tests with two different armies. Both with 2+ initiative and a free supreme commander (that's 100 points in space marine terms). One of these armies will be BL of course. The other will be Codex Marines.

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