Leviathan Unleashed: A Full 10th Edition Battle Report

It's here!  As promised, GW dropped a full battle report for Warhammer 10th Edition!  Now this is only going to be a Combat Patrol, so not everything will be applicable to the full game.  But we'll finally get to see how everything comes together on the table.

Let's also see if GW's battle report presentation has improved.

We get our first official look at a mission with Clash of Patrols.  Looks like Combat Patrol will continue to use the 44"X30" board.  

We also get to see an addition mission rule that lets players get additional CP during the game.  This doesn't appear to be an action, you just get the CP as long as you both control and objective and still have your Warlord.

We get a full look at the Combat Patrol, though I don't see any attached Ripper Swarms.  We already knew what these Combat Patrols were, but it's nice to get a new shot of each one.

They explain you'll get two enhancements and two secondaries to choose from.  

We've seen the enhancements but the secondaries are new.  Unfortunately, they don't show us both, just the one chosen by the player.  This Tyranid secondary rewards you for getting your Prime stuck in.

We then get the same treatment for the Space Marines.  This is a much smaller detachment, emphasizing just how elite those Terminators are.

We now get to see the selections for the Space Marine enhancements . . .

. . . and they're secondary.  It's almost identical to the Tyranid one, but produces fewer VP to represent how much tougher this Captain probably is.  Also, can I say that even a Heavy Metal paintjob isn't meant to be this zoomed in.  Though it does make some of those extreme details look almost more impressive.

Then it looks like we get the full text, or close to it, for the Leader ability.  It still doesn't spell out how Keywords work.  However, the whole unit becomes one Unit called an Attached unit.  It says this is for all rules purposes, so my guess is that means the unit shares the keywords of all models inside of it.

Attacker and Defender return, with the winner of the role off choosing which role they'll play.  For this game, the Defender deploys first and then they alternate.

We finally get Infiltrators.  The rule works as we expected it would, allowing you to deploy the unit anywhere on the battlefield outside of 9" of your opponents deployment zone and their models.  Infiltrators will probably be as important in 10th as they were in 9th, making sure you can establish early board control and block your opponents own Infiltrators and Deep Strike units.

Attacker and Defender don't appear to matter for who goes first, or anything else that happens during deployment.  It looks like it's just a straight roll off.

We then get a look at the Stratagem page.  No real rules or details here, though Simon does mention he gains a CP in his command phase.  The counter for Ben goes up too, showing that both players still gain CP.  Nothing new there though.

We then get to see the nerfed version of Oath of Moment that Combat Patrol uses.  It's still a flat reroll to hit, so it's definitely good.

Finally!  There's the confirmation that Stealth is -1 to hit.  Also, no datasheet yet, but Ben gives us that Von Ryan's are T5 with a 4+ Sv.  The Librarian then fires off his Psychic power, revealing that you do still get to shoot with all your guns.

We then get our full text for HAZARDOUS.  I'd already had this spoiled a bit, I knew it would be hard to avoid spoilers, though I'd found the description odd.  Now it makes senses though.  Instead of every 1 to hit killing your models, you now wait until after you've fired and roll a single dice for each HAZARDOUS weapon.  If the wielder isn't a Character, Monster, or Vehicle, you have to remove a model with that weapon.  If it's a Character, Monster, or Vehicle, they take 3 mortals.  That's a lot of mortals, especially with the new lower Wounds profiles.  The rule specifies your Character takes the mortals too, even if they've got a bodyguard.  Since I'm willing to bet Mortals spill over, this does mean a Psyker can still blow themselves up, taking other models with them.

All and all, though, this is far less punishing than previous Plasma rules or Perils of the Warp.  I think we'll be seeing plenty of players pushing their luck to get the most out of their weapons.

And there's Fights First.  It's . . . well it's Fights First.  It's interesting this now gets it's own step.

What has changed is who get's to pick the first unit on Fights First.  Before, the active player got first pick of Fights First units, then the inactive player got to choose the first Fights Normal.  Now it looks like it's always the inactive player that gets to pick.

We then get one of the Tyranid's Combat Patrol Stratagems.  A generic -1 to Hit is always useful.

After breezing through the Command Phase with only the barest mention of Battle-shock, we get Fire Overwatch.  It can be used in both the Movement and Charge phase now.  It still requires 6s to hit, but TORRENT bypasses it, making flamers even more useful for denying ground as in 8th and 9th.

After watching Simon burn Ben's Termagants off the board, and the use of Teeming Broods as was previously revealed in Combat Patrol, Simon uses Gene-Wrought Resilience.  This reminds me of Transhuman, but it scales much more reasonably.

Also, can I say, watching them squeal their way through this fight phase is much more enjoyable than other Battle Reports Warhammer Plus has done.  I might check out some of the more recent ones.  I'd previously found their presentation quite bland.  But they're doing a pretty good job of keeping me excited and interested.

And here's the full rules for the Battle-shock step that Ben breezed through before.  And there is something I was looking for!  Your unit does use the best Leadership it has.  So if you've joined Greyfax to a unit, you get to test on Leadership 4+!

The other thing I was looking for is that Battle-shock lasts until your next Command phase.  I was curious if you could roll to recover in each Command phase or if it was a flat duration.  Now this doesn't mean there aren't any Stratagems that will let you recover from Battle-shock, but we now know it's a fixed duration.  This means if you get Battle-shocked in your turn, say from Shadow in the Warp, you stay Battle-shocked until your next turn.

I'm also noting that the third bullet point says, "Its controlling player cannot use Stratagems to affect that unit."  So it's not just targeting the unit, no Stratagem you use can affect it at all!  I'm continuing to feel that Battle-shock will be an important mechanic in 10th Edition.

And there's a sticky objective Stratagem for Combat Patrol.

Huh!  I thought Termagants weren't getting Skulking Horrors in Combat Patrol.  Looks like the datasheet has been changed since it was revealed at Adepticon.  This is hopefully showing that GW is going to be taking full advantage of these digital datasheets to constantly adjust and balance them.

We then get to see some split fire, confirming that you can choose different targets for different weapons.

And there's another ability on the Captain.

And we get the full text for Feel No Pain, revealing it as an ability for the Psychophage.  Oh wow!  FNP now effects Mortal Wounds!  So from previous reveals it looks like you can have FNP against just Mortal Wounds, or full Feel No Pain.

And here's an ability for the Psychophage.

And a weapon!  Now we don't know if they'll be any changes to the full Datasheet, but in Combat Patrol they look like they're both excellent Anti-Psyker and really good against wounded units.

Oh!  And here's another weapon reveal!  Hah!

We get combat with the Prime, but they don't give us a full weapon reveal.  Instead, we get the fact their talons are S6 and AP-1.

A lot of this Battle Report has focused on the Psychophage, and they use it to reveal another Tyranid Stratagem with reroll to Hit.

And they also reveal a Space Marine Stratagem.  This is one has a nice, reroll Wounds of 1 with full rerolls for Monsters and Vehicles.

I'll have to double check, but I think this might be a better version of Fury of the First.  Nope, it's the same.  They also mention that the Psychophage is T9.

Just give us the Datasheet!

Well, we get Deadly Demise.  No real surprises here.  It's nice you roll it for Transports before you disembark the models, so they don't have to face a double jeopardy for their Transport blowing up.

We also get the full rules for Objective Control.  No surprises here, though we do get the strange reveal that you can't actually stand on the objective itself.  I guess GW wanted to make it easier to use custom objective markers, especially the ones they sell.

They tease the Prime's stats some more.  This is another one I wish they'd give us more of a peek at.

We then get Insane Bravery!  This is a step up from the old Strat, allowing you to immediately pass a failed Battle-shock test.  You would think with the rules for Battle-shock they would have had you use it in advance, but they specifically allowed an exception so this Stratagem would be more reactive.

With the battle wrapping up, we get a look at a special rule for Battleline units in Combat Patrol.  In remembrance of the old Obsec rule, they get sticky objectives instead.  This is important, since these smaller armies will have a greater difficulty with board control.

The final result reveals a couple more things for the game.  The first is that, as in 9th, all that matters if VP.  Even though Simon tabled Ben in the last turn, Ben still wins the game because of better scoring.  I honestly love this rule, as 40K is filled with stories of heroes sacrificing themselves to accomplish critical missions.  I'm glad to see it's still around.

I'm less glad to see that the silly 10 points for having a "Battle Ready" army is still here.  I honestly think this is a stupid rule.  Good players aren't going to hold unfinished models over there friends' heads, and tournaments already require painted miniatures.  The only people who will insist on their 10 points are probably the players you don't want to play with.

FINAL THOUGHTS

With that, I popped over to Warhammer Community to see if we get anything else.  Other than spotlighting the original plastic giant kit for 40 Years of Warhammer, we don't have anything new from this Battle Report.

On the whole, it's nice to see so many things spelled out for us.  While I really wish they would have released the datasheets for the models along with the Battle Report, I'm pretty sure it won't be long until we'll have more to enjoy.

And speaking of enjoyment, I want to reiterate this was a much better Battle Report presentation than the earlier ones on Warhammer Plus.  I don't know what GW's plans are for the ailing service.  But unlike Citadel Masterclass, where they kept changing it for the worse, it looks like they're at least making some good changes.  Not only were the shots extremely clean and crisp, but the presenters looked like they were genuinely having fun and I had fun with them.