special characters? help...

[dethangel]

i played 40k back in the late 90s (dark angels dont remember the edition) and i just recently started back up. the 5th edition DA codex rules are broken.. some how one of the oldest chapters has the weekest hq units and least avalibility of special weapons and units of all the SMs(yes im a little jaded about that)
so i will not use the DA codex until it hopefully gets fixed in the next edition.
so im building a SM army using the SM codex. i want to create my own chapter using these rules.
my question is can i use special characters like cpt. shrike in my army even though im not the ravenguard or brother-sgt kronus if im not the ultra marines??? for turnaments???

[Connjurus]

Yes, you can. You can only replace Chapter Tactics once, however - for example, if you take Lysander and Shrike, your army does not have both Infiltrate and Stubborn - you must choose one or the other.

[somerandomdude]

The reason the Dark Angels are the way they are is because it has been a long time since they've received an update. When they were first released they had many unique things about them (lots of plasma, terminators and bikes as troops) and now that just isn't the case. Their bikes and terminators are still somewhat unique, but not from a Force Organizational Chart (FOC) point of view. They also suffer from old wargear options if I remember correctly, and have costs that don't match up with the newer Space Marine books.

As for your question Connjurus is correct. For tournaments though, make sure your special character is modeled appropriately. You don't need them to be the standard model, and they don't need the standard color scheme, but match all of the wargear up so there are no questions. Don't give your Shrike counts-as a single Lightning Claw or a standard back pack for instance.

[dethangel]

thanks for clearing that up for me.. no one i play with could answer that.
on a side note. what happend to the weapons of old in 5th edition a lot of them are gone like hand flamers and vortex grenades?.
and the ranges are all chopped like for example lascannons use to shoot 72" now its 48" WTF its kinda dumb

[Connjurus]

The game is always going to be changing...if you look at the profiles for Characterhammer (second edition) and compare it to now, and you played marines, you'd likely complain because your badass Initiative seven Strength/Toughness 5(6? Don't remember) Librarian doesn't exist anymore.

The game is focused more around 6' - 4' tables, and GW realized that lots of weapons with high ranges were making CC armies not as effective, so they nerfed the ranges of most - not all, Conversion beamers are a "new" weapon that have a maximum range of 72" - weapons to fit this ideology, though I expect Tau will be keeping their range as it's really the only thing going for them.

[somerandomdude]

It's all relative. I haven't played any editions besides 5th, mind you, so I'm not sure how everything compared back in the past, but 48" and 72" isn't really different as far as those models care. What matters to them (and the 40k universe as a whole) is that a meltagun has a point blank range, a lascannon shoots from four times the distance, a battle cannon hit from behind an enemies front, and a deathstrike hits you from miles away. However GW converts that into our terms doesn't matter, as long as the relationships between particular guns makes sense.

Same with the stat profiles. It's not necessarily that certain people got slower/weaker (again, I never played back then, so maybe that was the case), it's that they had to change the scale to showcase the differences between races.

[somerandomdude]

The game is always going to be changing...if you look at the profiles for Characterhammer (second edition) and compare it to now, and you played marines, you'd likely complain because your badass Initiative seven Strength/Toughness 5(6? Don't remember) Librarian doesn't exist anymore.

Technically, he does exist, just take Might of the Ancients and The Quickening.

Fleet, I10, and S6 (2d6 penetration). You have to pass a couple tests, but no biggie.

[dethangel]

i think i know why GW castrated the SM and CSM. they were too powerful in the older editions so to make the other races more playable and collectable. they had to weaken them. if the point values were adjusted to better reflect the units field values. it would have done the same thing without stripping alot of weargear and weapons from them.am i wrong??
i have some of my old pieces assault marines with hand flamers. i cant use them anymore. Right?
ill just have to adjust my stratigies.

[Deathula]

i think i know why GW castrated the SM and CSM. they were too powerful in the older editions so to make the other races more playable and collectable. they had to weaken them. if the point values were adjusted to better reflect the units field values. it would have done the same thing without stripping alot of weargear and weapons from them.am i wrong??
i have some of my old pieces assault marines with hand flamers. i cant use them anymore. Right?
ill just have to adjust my stratigies.

If you have a whole squad probably not, but I dont see why you can't use one as a regular flamer.

[Connjurus]

Sometimes, on particularly dark nights, I miss my Daemon prince with a Dreadaxe and Daemon stature.