Wow how did we miss this one? Checkout a big change to the weapon every Space Marine carries that we always seem to forget about, until now.

+++Update+++

The source of this story Jesse Ervin sent us a screen shot of the digital version of the Combat Blade which we used in the post after verifying the information in BOTH of our digital copies of the new Horus Heresy Red Books.

Our Digital Version

At the time of this writing the this was 100% accurate information from our personal in-print copies of the book, furthermore no retraction or FAQ/Errata was located on Forge World’s site and no searches were found on Google about combat blades’ information being inaccurate.

After a brief conversation on Facebook between Spikey Bits and Jesse Ervin he continued to indicate to us the benefits of this supposed rules change.

However immediately after our post went live Jesse Ervin, on the very same Facebook thread, posted a picture from the previous day of his conversation with Forge World about the status of this rule that he and his gaming group had submitted to us.

Obviously Jesse Ervin willingly withheld information from us purposefully, and with malice misled Spikey Bits’ readers.

Why Jesse Ervin was so co-operative with Forge World but so morally irresponsible about his dealings with Spikey Bits’ readers may never be clear.

Please continue reading this post with the information that the Combat Blade may be corrected for the digital version in the near future, and enjoy the rest of the changes to the new Horus Heresy Age of Darkness supplement outlined below.

Original Article:

The new Age of Darkness Red book is out for all Legions, and they’ve done a great job updating it to include new rules changes, as well was the January FAQ update.

30k fanatic Garro just put out a comprehensive list of changes to the book as well. But it seems like we all may have missed the smallest of details:

The innocuous Combat Blade can be taken by both the Assault and Tactical Squads in 30k for starters.

Checkout the old version versus the (verified) new version:

Old Version – Pretty lackluster, grants +1 attack in most cases…

New Version – AP2, Unwieldy, Reaping Blow

Wow so that means every Space Marine pretty much is carrying around an AP2 power weapon??? Sure it strikes last, and may not get an extra attack depending, but smart 30k force commanders can easily mitigate those drawbacks when launching their assaults I feel like!

Figuratively every Legionnaire can have a power weapon in 30k now – that seems to be a pretty huge change that we all may have over looked!

And hey, both of those squads just went down in price too…

Troops Choices

– Legion tacticals squads are -25 pts base

– Legion assault squads are -75 pts base

Special thanks to Jesse Ervin for bringing this oversight to our attention!

Checkout the rest of the Age of Darkness Changes:

Thanks to Garro from the 30k Heresy forums for putting this list together and sharing !

Age of Darkness rules changes

– The ‘imperial armour units in age of darkness games’ rule has been replaced. Instead of ‘any unit’ it is now a fixed list of units.

– Clarification of having multiple characters with the ‘must be warlord’ rule. Simply put, you can’t. Only primarchs override this.

– Tank squadrons have command tank upgrade which is +10pts over old price

tanks with pintile-mounted options have multi-meltas added for same price as havoc launcher.

HQ Choices

– Moritat chain fire rules updated to include the overheat rules from the jan 2016 FAQ.

legion command squad base cost is -25 pts

– Additional LCS members are -5 pts

Elites Choices

– Veteran tactical squads -25 pts to base cost

– Veteran Marines are -3 pts each

– VTS has additional weapons from FAQ added

– Techmarines are -10 pts each base

– Servo-automata has heavy bolter, multi-melta, and missile launcher added to their wargear options

apothecarion detachment has list of units removed, may join any unit will ‘legiones astartes’ rule that isn’t in terminator armour or have the daemon rule

– Apothecarion detachment can purhcase jump packs and SM bikes, allowing them to join like equipped units.

– Dreadnoughts all have +1 attack (to base 3) as per FAQ

– Volkite culverins in contemtpor dreads replaced with the twin-linked version

– Legion rapier squads thudd guns only have frag rounds to start with. May purchase additional rounds as in Book 6, including phosphex

Troops Choices

– Legion tacticals squads are -25 pts base

– Legion assault squads are -75 pts base

– Additional assault Marines are -2 pts each

– Breacher squad -25 pts base

– Additional Breacher marines are +5 pts each

– Tactical support squad can take additonal close combat weapon for 2 pts; rotor cannon and volkite charger upgrades are now free upgrades

– Reconnaissance squad is -25 pts base

Dedicated Transports

– Legion dreadnought drop pods are +35 pts

Fast Attack

– Legion Seekers are -20 pts base

_ A dditional marines are +5 pts

– Sunfury missiles on Lightning is +10 pts

– Kraken missiles are +10 pts

– Phosphex bomb cluster -10 pts

– Electromagnetic bomb charges are -10 pts

– Tarantulas are +5 pts each

– Tarantula squads lose forward deployment

– Dreadclaw drop pods +15 pts

– Dreadclaw listed as only carrying regular and contemptor dreads, not Leviathan or Dreadeo types

– Landspeeders are -10 pts each

– Hunter killer missiles are -5 pts each now

– Javelins are -20 pts each

– Javelins gain strafing run USR

– Units attacking a Javelin in close combat suffer a -2 to hit while it isn’t immobilsed

Heavy Support

– New jetbike unit

– Just regular jetbikers with multi-melta as basic, base squad is +30 pts over normal jetbike squad

– May only go to 5 men in total, additional jetbikes are +15 pts over normal jetbikes

– May upgrade to volkite or plasma for cost, all of the squad must be the same

– May take sergeant upgrade

– Deathstorm drop pod has automated weapons rule, basically old rule of automatically shooting all units within range (enemy or friend) when it arrives

– LR Phobos is -25 pts

– LR Proteus is -20 pts

– Land Raider Achilles can take thudd gun ammos same as rapiers, at same price

– Achilles-Alpha can take additonal ammo types

– Vindicators are now squadrons as in Book 6 with additional rules from FAQ

– Spartan is +10 pts

– Laser destroyers are free upgrades on Spartan

– Flare shield is +20 pts

– Sicaran Venator may take second pintle-mounted weapon

– Sicaran is +30 pts and can take a pintle mounted weapon

– Kharybdis is -25 pts

– Deredeo dreadnought has third arm option, heavy lascannon option S10, AP2 heavy 2, Exoshock

– Exoshock – if a hit scores a penetrating hit, then on a 4+ a second automatic pen is caused ignoring cover

– Whirlwind Scorpius can take pintle-mounted weapons

– Malcador is now heavy support with -25 pts base cost

– Battlespeed now allows it to fire its main weapon (top turret) at full BS skill before or after moving flat out

– Malcador is 1-3 in squadrons

– Malcador receives wider range of wargear selection covering basic stuff like pintle-mounted weapons

Lords of War

– Typhon is +45 pts base

– Falchion is +25 pts

– Falchion can take a neutron wave capacitor which adds the ‘feedback’ and ‘shock pulse’ special rules to its Volcano Cannon

Rites of War

– Orbital Assault – dreadnought and contemptor talons can take dreadclaws or dreadnought drop pods even in talons of 2 or 3

– Rapier batteries can take drop pods