“So long as there remains one who still rages in the name of justice and truth, the galaxy shall yet know hope.”

–Ragnar Blackmane

Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announce The Howl of Blackmane, the first War Pack in the Warlord cycle for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest!

The Howl of Blackmane introduces sixty new cards to expand your battles in the grim and gritty future of Warhammer 40,000: Conquest. You’ll find a battle-ready new Space Marine warlord with his eight-card signature squad offering new ideas for conquering the Traxis sector. Additionally, you’ll find three copies each of seventeen different cards that invite you to join the ranks of the Inquisition, experiment with heretical technology, or embark upon a sector-spanning Waaagh!

As the first pack of the Warlord cycle, The Howl of Blackmane brings your warlords to the forefront of your battles in the Traxis sector. New warlords are introduced in every War Pack, leading bloodthirsty armies, and bringing new strategies for achieving victory. You’ll find more than new warlords, however. Other cards introduced in The Howl of Blackmane and throughout the cycle put the focus directly on your warlord, whether by granting benefits to your other forces, orchestrating army movements, or exhausting to trigger powerful tactics.

In addition to powerful new warlords, the Warlord cycle introduces our new LCG® packaging to Warhammer 40,000: Conquest War Packs! This packaging is molded plastic, but every War Pack still contains the full complement of sixty cards.

Throughout the War Packs of the Warlord cycle, every faction receives a new warlord, ranging from an Imperial Inquisitor to an Eldar Phoenix Lord, and each of these new champions encourages the exploration of a new style of play.

For more on The Howl of Blackmane and the main themes of the Warlord cycle, we turn to developer Brad Andres.

Developer Brad Andres on the Warlord Cycle

Throughout the Warlord cycle, we explored the impact of warlords upon the game. These powerful warriors and leaders are the lifeblood of Conquest, and the design of a new warlord meant defining how the warlord would play the game.

Throughout the cycle, we needed to answer questions ranging from, “How will this warlord try to win?” to “What makes this warlord unique compared to others in the same faction?” Each warlord and its signature squad brings a new deck type to the table, ripe for expansion with the addition of other cards in the cycle.

The first of these new warlords is the Wolf Lord, Ragnar Blackmane (The Howl of Blackmane, 1). Ragnar is designed to hunt down your opponent’s warlord by engaging it in battle as much as possible. The strategy of hunting is a perfect thematic fit for the Space Wolves; these Space Marines were engineered to murder empires and tear apart anyone that stands in the way of the Imperium. Ragnar’s signature unit, the Blackmane Sentinel (The Howl of Blackmane, 2), continues the theme of hunting down your rivals. A Blackmane Sentinel is a fearsome unit that can move from anywhere on the board to corner a warlord wherever Ragnar tracks it. Even if you can’t guess the location of your opponent’s warlord on the first try, Blackmane’s Hunt (The Howl of Blackmane, 5) allows you to follow your rival’s warlord to an adjacent planet, completing your hunt and meeting it in battle.

Confronting your opponent head-on brings you face-to-face with danger, but the Weapon Frostfang (The Howl of Blackmane, 3) can drastically increase one unit’s attack power and hit points, helping you win a showdown with a rival warlord. And when your opponent tries to flee from your ravening wolves, a Morkai Rune Priest punishes your opponent for thinking he might escape unscathed.

Ragnar is only the first of many familiar warlords to be found in this cycle. You can look forward to seeing Inquisitors, Ethereals, and Greater Daemons in battle. Each new warlord brings a new deck type and play experience for players to explore.

The Warlord cycle doesn’t just introduce new warlords. It features a host of supporting cards that make the strategic use of your warlord more critical than ever. Cards like Muster the Guard (The Howl of Blackmane, 7) require you to exhaust your warlord as part of the ability cost, offering a huge benefit in return. Other cards, such as the Bork’an Recruits,become stronger while in the presence of a warlord, making the decision of where to commit a warlord even more consequential.

The Howl of Blackmane and the other War Packs in the Warlord cycle introduce a host of new warlords and abilities to Warhammer 40,000: Conquest, bombarding the Traxis sector with powerful new abilities, strategies, and combinations. These cards were designed to make your war for galactic dominance more intense than ever, and I hope you have as much fun playing it as I did designing it!

What Is a War Pack?

Warhammer 40,000: Conquest is a Living Card Game®, meaning that rather than collectible randomized booster packs, it receives monthly expansions known as War Packs. Each War Pack contains sixty cards, offering a full playset of each unit, attachment, event, and support card within.

Each War Pack expands the Warhammer 40,000 universe within Conquest, offering new deck-building options with a fixed distribution model, allowing players to focus on building decks and playing games, rather than chasing rare cards. The Howl of Blackmane is the first War Pack for Warhammer 40,000: Conquest.

Hunt Among the Stars

Begin your wild hunt across the galaxy with Ragnar Blackmane and the other cards from The Howl of Blackmane War Pack. Whether you employ Blackmane’s aggressive tactics, revel in the torture of the Dark Eldar, or harness the powerful technology of the Tau empire, you’ll find new units, attachments, supports, and events to use throughout your battles in the Traxis sector.

Look for The Howl of Blackmane to arrive at your local retailer in the fourth quarter of 2014!