Sisters of Battle are one of those factions that many people care a lot about. So are you concerned about what will happen to them in the new edition of Warhammer 40,000? I am, so lets see what in store for Sisters fans everywhere.
While this is not out yet, it comes from a good source who has been obviously waiting for Sisters of Battle to come back and be good. There is a review of what he read afterwards, and is of course his own opinion (since I have not yet seen any of this personally) at this point of the game.
via sent in from someone who apparently has seen the new Index.
Hey, as Sisters of Battle are the only force worth mentioning here are some
changes made to the army:
The Sisters have been "half split" into 2 parts: Adeptus Ministorum and
Adepta Sororitas
of your Order (Chapter for you Spheezee Mehreene players) and can be
changed to whatever you like. Example would be "Order of Expensive Metal
Models We WANT PLASTIC!". This would change the Canoness Lead the
Righteous ability to say "You can re-roll all hit rolls of 1 for
friendly Order of Expensive Metal Models We WANT PLASTIC! units within
6" of this model.
Acts of Faith
Roll a D6 at the start of each of your turns. On a roll of 2+, one unit
from your army with the Acts of Faith ability can perform an Act of
Faith chosen from the following list. Som abilities may allow you to use
more than on Act of Faith in the same turn; when this is the case, a
different unit must be chosen to perform each Act of Faith.
First glance impressons: We are back to the White Dwarf of uselessness
with an Act of Faith system that does not scale with larger armies.
1D6 per 500pts (whatever that is in power points) would be better or
with the new acts of faith allowing a unit to use any of them once per game.
An army ability should be powerful and represent the army, one unit per
turn out of 5 is decent, one out of 10 is meh and beyond is bad.
You can do more than one AoF per turn though, more on this later.
Hand of the Emperor: The unit can immediately move as if it were the
Movement phase.
Divine Guidance: The unit can immediately shoot as if it were the
Shooting phase.
The Passion: The unit can, if it is within 1" of an enemy unit,
immediately pile in and attack as if it were the Fight phase.
Spirit of the Martyr: One model in the unit recovers D3 lost wounds, or
you can return a single slain model to the unit with 1 wound remaining.
First glance impressions: Interesting but very lacking, Divine Guidance
is the new Twin-Linked and The Passion seems pretty meh/useless to be
honest (haven't played a game though nor read the full rulebook yet. Got
that next to me and will flip through it tonight.)
I would have liked to see one that gives +1 To Hit with all attacks
until your next turn, or all attacks auto hit for this turn.
Divine Intervention could have been all models get an Invulnerable save
equal to their armor save like they had in 3E Witch Hunter codex or even
make it so no attack could lower the armor save of models in the unit
for a game turn.
The Passion could have been a unit can move D6 and if within 1" of enemy
models charge them.
Hand of the Emperor could have been good for assault if transports had
the Acts of Faith ability, then you could move the vehicle and then
during your movement phase disembark and later assault.
Shield of Faith: 6+ Inv save and can deny one psychic power in each
enemy psychic phase in the same manner as a psyker but on D6 instead of 2D6.
Zealot: re-roll failed to hit rolls in a turn which the unit charged,
made a heroic intervention or was charged by an enemy unit.
Uriah Jacobus: 5power
4++
Banner of Sanctity: +1Ld to ministorum and AM units within 6"
All Priests
4++
M6"
War Hymns: You can add 1 to the Attack characteristics of all friendly
Ministorum and astra militarum infantry within 6" of any friendly
ministorum priest.
Crusaders: 1power for 2 models, 5power for 10
M6" WS3 S3 A2
Zealot
Acts of Faith: This is new
Death Cult Assassins: 1power for 2, 5 for 10
M7" WS3 S4 A4
5+ 5++
Zealot
Death Cult Power blades are AP -2, power swords are -3 which they do NOT
have anymore
Arco-Flagellants
M7" WS3 S4 A2
7+5++
Zealot
Arco flails: +1S and D3 attacks instead of 1. So this means 2D3 for each
Arco at S5 - They could have just made the model S5 unless this is
future proofing for plastic Arco-Flagellants with other weapon options.
Penitent Engine: 6power for 1, 18 for 3
M7" WS3 S5 T6 W7 A4 Ld8 4+
Zealot
Desperate for Redemption: Roll a D6 after completing the first set of
attacks for units of Penitent Engines in each Fight phase. On a roll of
4+, the unit can immediately pile in and attack for a second time.
Penitent Buzz-Blades S2x Ap-3 Damage 3
First glance impressions: Pretty good from the look of things. Got to
love Desperate for Redemption. Does this prove GW reads dexes sent to
them? I read a wishlisting dex by MadCowCrazy and it had an ability with
the exact same name for the Penitent Engine and Sisters Repentia though
it basically forced them to deploy and scout move as close to the
opponent as possible during setup.
Adepta Sororitas section
Fluff notice: "So it was that the Sisters of Battle were recruited by
the millions, their orders rising from the flames of cataclysm (age of
apostasy) that saw the Imperium all but devour itself.
For those that don't know GW killed of 99.999999% of all sisters in an
earlier Sisters codex, stating that there were just the primary orders
and they contained some 10 000 sisters each and nothing else. So sisters
have gone from millions to less than 100,000 and now back to millions.
Technically it should be billions but GW and numbers....
Celestine: 8power +3 per geminae of 2 max
12" 2+2+3+3+7 6 9 2+ 4++
Bacon of Faith: +1 Shield of Faith Inv 6" bubble, Astra militarum and
ministorum gain 6+ inv save. Yeah yeah, it's Beacon of Faith but she is
just so delicious.
The Armour of Saint Katherine: 4++ for her and Geminae
Saintly Blessings: Unit within 6+ can perform an Act of Faith.
Healing Tears: Resurrect 1 geminae at start of each movement phase
Miraculous Intervention: Resurrection of Celestine once per game with
full wounds.
Canoness:4 points
6" 2+ 2+ 3 3 5 4 9 3+4++
Now has Rosarius as standard
Lead the Righteous mentioned above
Can't take jump pack
Imagifier: 2pts
6" 3+ 3+ 3 3 4 3 8 3+
AoF, SoF (Shield of Faith)
Simulacrum Imperialis: D6 start of turn on 4+ unit within 6" can perform
Act of Faith
First glance impressions: This is GWs "fix" to the problem of Acts of
Faith not scaling with larger armies. You basically need to spam these
models around and pray you roll a 4+. Doesn't this turn Sisters into a
gunline army instead of a mid/close shooty army?
Hospitaller: 2pts
6" 4+ 3+ 3 3 4 2 8 3+
Chirurgeons tools S user -1AP
Aof, SoF
Healer: End of movement. Adepta Sororitas Infantry unit within 3", roll
D6. On 4+ one model recovers D3 lost wounds (IG medipack recovers 1
wound), if no wounded 1 slain model can be returned to the unit with 1
wound. A unit can only be targeted once per turn.
Dialogus: 1pts
6" 4+ 3+ 3 3 4 2 8 6+
Dialogus staff +1S -1To Hit
6" Adepta Sororitas re-roll morale bubble
Battle Sisters: 4pts per 5 up to 15
6" 4+ 3+ 3 3 1 1 7 3+
Same as before, so no benefit in taking more than 5 models because you
can only take 2 special or 1 special 1 heavy per unit instead of per 5
models.
Seraphim: 4pts per 5 up to 10
12" 3+ 3+ 3 3 1 1 7 3+
Same as before
Celestian: 5pts per 5 up to 10
6" 3+ 3+ 3 3 1 2 8 3+
2 special or 1 special 1 heavy per UNIT
Bodyguard: Character within 3" transfers a wound to unit on 2+, this
wound becomes a Mortal Wound
Mistress of Repentance: 2pts
6" 3+ 3+ 3 3 4 3 8 3+
Neural Whips S User, -2AP Damage1 Add 1 to the wound rolls for attacks
made with this weapon if the target unit's highest LD is less than 8
excluding vehicles. Does this mean the attack does +1Damage, +1 damage
dice or do you get +1 on to wound rolls?
Driven Onwards: re-roll advance, charge and hit rolls for friendly
Repentia within 6" of this model.
Repentia Squad:3 per 3 up to 9
6" 3+ 3+ 3 3 1 2 8 7+
Penitent Eviscerator SX2 -2AP Damage 2 -1 To Hit
So their Eviscerator is worse than a normal one with -4AP
Aof, SoF
Retributor Squad: 6pts +4 for 5more models
6" 4+ 3+ 3 3 1 1 7 3+
Same as before, max 4 heavy weapons per unit so no point taking more models.
Aof, SoF
Dominion: 5 + 4 for 5 more models
Same as above but 4 special weapons
AoF, SoF
Vanguard: After deployment, before first turn, move as in movement
phase. If all models inside transport has this rule then transport may
move instead.
Rhino and Immolator
T7 W10
Exorcist T8 W12
Points costs:
Arco 15
Battle Sisters 9
Canoness 45
Celestian 11
Crusaders 11
Death Cult 17
Dialogus 15
Dominion 10
Exorcist 160
Hospitaller 30
Imagifier 40
Immolator 68
Priest 35
Mistress of Repentance 35
Penitent Engine 55 - I thought WOW at first glance then realized the
mode costs 95pts... scroll down...
Repentia 17
Retributor 9
Seraphim 11
Sororitas Rhino 73
Celestine 150
-Geminae Superia 50each
Uriah Jacobus 100
Melee weapons, if weapon isn't mentioned it's points cost is 0
Eviscerator 22 for S6 Ap -4, SM costs 22pts for S8 Ap -4 why does it cost the same!!!!
Either make is S8 for everyone or lower the pts
costs for S3 models!!!
Neural Whips 3 - Only reason I can think of that it's weapons has a
points cost is future proofing for a plastic model with other weapon
options.
Penitent buzz-blades 40 - Only reason I can think of that it's weapons
has a points cost is future proofing for a plastic model with other
weapon options.
Power axe 5
Power Maul 4
Power Sword 4
Ranged Weapons, if weapon isn't mentioned it's points cost is 0
Combi - flamer 11 melta 19 plasma 15
Condemnor boltgun 1 - Same as a regular bolter but D3 damage vs psykers
Flamer 9
Hand Flamer 6
Heavy Bolter 10
Heavy Fmaler 17
Hunter killer missile 6
Immolation Flamer 35
Inferno pistol 12
Meltagun 17
Plasma gun 13 pistol 7
Storm Bolter 4
Twin Heavy bolter 17
Twin multi-melta 54
Review from the source.
As a long time sisters player and collector I expected to be
disappointed and I was pretty much right. I haven't played any 8E games
and will read the main rules next but at first glance it seems they
didn't balance this army as much as was needed. Probably because play
testers had no idea how sisters work or what's wrong with them. Not many
people play or collect sisters, would have been nice if someone
passionate from the community had playtested them and pointed out the
problems.
Here are what comes to mind at first glance:
Faith system: Feels pretty meh, not enough Acts of Faith and as always
they aren't balanced against each other. Divine Guidance is the one that
will get picked 95% of the time. Sisters have basically been turned into
a gunline army where you stay back and hope your Imagifiers can give
units an Act of Faith.
If each unit could perform an act of faith once per game on a 2+ then
you'd have a reason to run forwards and hope to get it off.
Now there is a 50/50 chance unless you use your Army or Celestine
ability on a key unit. 1 free per turn works wonders on few units and I
wouldn't be surprised at all to see people take single auxilliary units
of Dominions or Retributors to get a double shooting unit each turn.
Hand of the Emperor would be good if it had the clause: If all models in
a transport has the Acts of Faith keyword then the transport may perform
the move instead. Similar to how Vanguard works.
Some more interesting ones like Divine Intervention models get inv save
equal to armour save or attacks can't reduce the armour save of the unit
for 1 turn or no more than 1 wound can be afflicted by each attack
instead of D6 or whatever.
The Passion is the worst one for many reasons, sisters suck in combat
being the main one. What unit would you want to use this with? Repentia
and Crusaders seems to be the most viable options. But you can use it in
desperation I hear you say, or I can use another unit to shoot twice.
D6 movement and then assault, heck allow a unit to assault from a
transport that has move would have been better.
Sisters are all about sacrifice so why not such an Act of Faith? Allows
you to shoot into close combat but misses hit your own models, auto hit
would be failed to wound rolls are allocated to your own models.
I take it we can expect to see a 3 character combo box like the
Genestealer cult got, this time with Imagifier, Hospitaller and Dialogus.
Laud Hailer could be so much more than just re-roll morale as well. It
plays the warhymns of the Ecclesiarchy after all. So why allow units to
move, run and then shoot, or instead of D6 run get double movement.
Bonus for assault of some sort. Laud hailers on vehicles could allow the
unit to assault after disembarking from a transport that has moved. This
could be a very interesting Laud Hailer, that you could put sororitas
units in any transport, move it, then disembark and charge.
It's really good to see that most Sister Superiors can take Eviscerators
again, they lost that ability in the WD, digital and Imperial Agents book.
Now Superiors from Battle Sister, Celestian, Retributor and Dominions
can take weapons from the Melee weapon list which includes the
Eviscerator and I didn't see any stars that prevents that.
Also happy to see that Hospitallers are better healers than a guardman
with a medi-pack.
Really happy to see the Sisters now number in the millions instead of
less than 100,000.
Penitent Engines seem good. A Dreadnought is 6" 3+ 3+ 6 7 8 4 8 3+ for
70pts vs M7" 3+ 5+ S5 T6 W7 A4 Ld8 4+ for 95pts
Interesting thing is that Dreadnoughts can explode when reduced to 0
wounds, Penitent Engines can not.
Here is the problem with GW and points costs, ranged units are almost
always cheaper than close combat units. It should be the other way
around since a close combat unit has to do just that, get close, which
means they will be a priority target. The Dreadnought is cheaper, has
the same number of attacks even though it only has 1 DCCW, has a better
save, more S, T and W, on top of this is comes with an assault cannon
and storm bolter, smoke launcher as well if you count that. All this and
it's 25pts cheaper, the thing Penitent Engine has is the Desperate for
Redemption rule which is the most powerful rule I've seen so far and 1"
more movement. So at a glance I would have expected the Dreadnought to
be more expensive since it's superior in all ways except for the
Desperate for Redemption rule and 1" less movement.
Most of the codex seems decent, only time will tell if I'm wrong and
sisters are still complete shit compared to everything else.
Some wishlisting: Allow any model to exchange the boltgun for a bolt
pistol so that all Adepta Sororitas models could dual wield pistols.
Change per unit to per 5 models on the number of special and heavy
weapons a unit can carry, sisters only have access to the holy trinity
of bolter, flamer and melta so it'd make sense if they had more of them
than anyone else.
Allow Seraphims to take 1 hand flamer and 1 inferno pistol, give them
the rule that if they can wound a transport vehicle they can also flame
anyone inside.
Make Loud Hailers more interesting than re-roll morale, like allowing
any unit to assault after disembarking from any vehicle equipped with a
Laud Hailer or that was also transporting a Dialogus. Dialogus must also
assault if able to do so.
Interesting vehicle upgrades like promethium tap, increasing the range
of any model equipped with a flamer that's in base contact with the
vehicle by half the weapons normal length. Negative is that the vehicle
explodes on 5+ and does D6 mortal wounds.
Sisters only have access to the Holy Trinity of bolter, flamer and
melta. Why not give Retributors a Trinity Heavy Bolter with a special
combi melta that can be used as a normal melta in focused blast or as a
flamer with wide dispersion. Deathwatch has a Heavy Bolter with flamer
and when I saw that it fit pretty well with sisters in my opinion.
Give Immolator side sponsons with heavy bolters, heavy flamers or multi
meltas.
Allow any model in a Celestian squad to take any weapon, this would make
the unit more interesting than just a wound sponge for characters.
Change the WS of ALL Adepta Sororitas to 3+. WS doesn't determine how
good a unit is in close combat, S and I did. Now we only have WS and S
so let me ask you this, is a Battle Sister better trained in close
combat than a guardsman? They are still just S3, so WS3 would go a long
way to properly represent the Elite nature of the Sisters of Battle.