Blood Angels Honour Guard Upgrade Question

[lobster-overlord]

Hi all,

I'm building my first Honor Guard (never used them in C:SM), so I have a question about upgrading the guys per the rules in the BA Codex.

Equipment includes:
Boltgun or Bolt Pistol
Chainsword


If I upgrade one to a Blood Champion, does he keep his Boltgun/Bolt Pistol option, or does he lose all ranged weapons. The text reads "One Honour Guard can be upgraded to a Blood Champion with power weapon and combat shield" It makes no mention of "Replacing" gear, just "upgrading".

And once you have the Blood Champion in the unit, your Composition is now

3 Honour Guards
1 Blood Champion
1 Sanguinary Novitiate

The other upgrades all specifically say "One" or "Any Honour Guard" and not "any model can" when replacing, so once you are a Blood Champion or if you are the Sang Nov, can you NOT upgrade any of the equipment? I know we touched on briefly the SN's gear in a thread about what the Exsanguinator was, but not fully on upgrading.

So to recap, my two questions are:

1) Does a Blood Champion keep his ranged weapon option
and
2) Is a BC or SN upgradable on their weapon options that remain (if BC keeps ranged weapon, can he change it to a different one, and can the SN get something other than a Bolt weapon)

THanks,

John M>

[Sir Biscuit]

He keeps all his regular wargear, and doesn't have to replace anything. You don't have to replace anything unless it says you do.

So a blood champion will have a power weapon, a combat shield, power armor, a boltgun or bolt pistol, a chainsword, and frag and krak grenades.

[lobster-overlord]

Ok, so I can then upgrade him to a Plasma Pistol, then upgrade him to a Blood Champion, and I'm good? That's the way I was seeing it. But the SN is not an "Honour Guard" by title, so is he upgradable?

[Dantethegolden]

see, i took that to mean that he replaces his chainsword with a power weapon, and adds a combat shield (combat shields let you keep your ccw and a pistol). it doesn't say "replace", this is true, but it makes sense to me this way. two different swords plus a pistol and a shield is a lot to carry around.

for the SN, the wording IS a little dicey. I'd still say that, since he is IN the honor guard, he can upgrade his equipment. this might have to be FAQ'd, though. If you go purely RAW, then no, he can't. I guess that makes sense, since he's also toting around that chalice.

[lobster-overlord]

The overall unit is looking like this right now...

Sang Nov w/ Boltgun
Honor Guard w/ Melta Gun
Honor Guard w/ Infernus Pistol
Honor Guard w/ Plasma Gun

and I want the fifth to be a Blood Champion w/ Plasma Gun.

at 12 inches 2 bolt gun shots, 5 plasma shots and 2 melta. If assaulting, i'd get the pop with the Infernus and then have 11 attacks, and I plan to have a Chap/Recl with them.
This would make the unit fairly shooty as well as have some decent luck in CC.

John M>

[addamsfamily36]

the novitiate is a member of the honor guard and as such has certain equipment, but he can upgrade to take say a power sword etc. he's not an independent character and counts as part of the unit for all intensive purposes. thats why i like the honor guard as they effectively get a priest for free. :D

Atleast this is my understanding of it. the unit is called the honour guard, and all im it count as honor guard for equipment selection.

[Eusebius Rex]

Bit off topic, but - is the C:BA HonorGuard considered a retinue that a corresponding unit MUST be with? Or is it a regular squad that simply is a non-FOC HQ unit (only allowable when you take a BA: HQ.

I'm just wandering if Mehpeston and The Sanguinor are eligible to take a BA Honor Guard and be part of the unit despite not being ICs. Right now, I am leaning towards "no".

[addamsfamily36]

The honor guard unit becomes unlockable when you have a HQ however that HQ does not have to go round with the honor guard. i take mephistion and take the honor guard as they are a cheap way of getting options close to vanguard, and with the banner they have 5 attacks on the charge thats just nice :)

i havent got my blood angels codex to hand, but i would put decent money, that the unit entry says somethign along the lines of you may take an honor guard unit if you have a HQ choice.

[Dingareth]

the novitiate is a member of the honor guard and as such has certain equipment, but he can upgrade to take say a power sword etc. he's not an independent character and counts as part of the unit for all intensive purposes. thats why i like the honor guard as they effectively get a priest for free. :D

Atleast this is my understanding of it. the unit is called the honour guard, and all im it count as honor guard for equipment selection.

You could not be further from the truth. He is part of an Honor Guard squad; however, he is not an Honor Guard, he is a Sanguinary Novitiate. Just as a Space Marine Sergeant may not take a Heavy weapon in a Tactical Squad, the Novitiate may not take any special equipment. Likewise, upon upgrading one of the Honor Guard to Blood Champion, he no longer can take any options, although he will be armed with Bolt Pistol, Close Combat Weapon, Power Weapon, Combat Shield, and of course grenades and Power Armor

[addamsfamily36]

Yup hands up my bad, just grabbed my codex read it twice, and yup as rules as written you cant upgrade the noviate.

personally i think this might be faq'd at a later date but then again it might not. a normal sanguinary priest can take pretty much similar options that the honor guard can, so i don't see why the noviate shouldn't be able to as well, he is part of a very elite squad.

however yes my bad. was probably getting too excited and a red mist decended over my eyes as i read the book lol

[Dingareth]

It didn't get FAQ'd in the vanilla Dex, Apothecaries still can't take wargear there so I suspect that it won't get FAQ'd here either.

So, in the meantime, don't count on that if you're going to start modeling up an Honor Guard.

[addamsfamily36]

If anything ive jsut saved a few points to spend else where lol :) always a good thing. and yeh im not going to give him anythign else but what he can take. if it does get changed (which is doubtful if im honest, especially from what you jsut said about the vanilla SM) i'll decided what to do then.

[Tynskel]

I had always read it this way...

Any honour guard can take following...

purchase upgrades-- then take one honour guard and upgrade to Blood Champion. Technically you bought his equipment, then bought his powersword. Reads just like RAW. There is NOT an order to the list.

[lobster-overlord]

What Tynskel hits on is what I'm doing. Buying equipment for the Honor Guard guy, then upgrading him to a BC, and he already has the weapons purchased, thus doesn't have to replace them.

The SN I just wasn't sure about, but RAW means "no, he's an SN not an HG, other wise, it would say 'any model'"

John M.

[Dingareth]

And the Blood Champion has his own stat line just like Apothecaries, Pain Boyz, Company Champions, and Sanguinary Novitiates. Therefore following along those lines he cannot take a special weapon. A model can only be one thing, it doesn't matter what they were, it matters what they are...

[lobster-overlord]

But you don't have to upgrade him until after purchasing other items before that... No where does it say you have to go option for option in order of the list given. You can, while he is an HG still, purchase the weapon you want, then purchase the upgrade to the BC level, and it doesn't say replace. Like with Libbys and Reclus, it says "replace such and such and give Terminator armor" which also changes the stat line (sv changes).

That's ultimately what I'm asking... where does it say I CANNOT purchase the options I want and then upgrade him to BC. As that is what I want to do. If it says somewhere that as an HG, I have to upgrade him first then put forth the other options, I wouldn't be able to upgrade him because he would be the BC before and thus name/stats change making him ineligibile for options.

[addamsfamily36]

see to me it makes taking a blood champion pointless. as the rest of the unit can take storm sheilds which jsut laugh at his combat sheild, so the champion of the unit is out quipped by the rest....thats jsut stupid yet how it is :mad:

[Sir Biscuit]

There isn't an order to the list, so yes, you may upgrade the weapons options of a veteran and then upgrade him into a Blood Champion, and he will get to keep his wargear.

[Angelus Mortifer]

The SN comes with what he has and cannot take any upgrades because he has a separate entry within the stat-line list. In the pdf codex, you could give the SN in an HG squad pretty much any available upgrade because HG, no matter who they actually were, were all one stat-line and one named entry on that list.

You can however give the Blood Champion other Waregear as he starts off initially as a standard HG. Because their is no upgrade specifically for an SN, he comes as is.