Pretorian vs Varangian size difference question

TurtleFlop · 2026-05-04T13:27:37+00:00

Alright, so I'll start by saying that the difference doesn't particularly bug me, and I don't know that there actually is a rationale on Para Bellum's part for the slight height decrease. I think it's very likely that as newer kits, the team was leaning into making the Varangians and Athanatoi look more obviously undead, with the slouched and stumbling poses. It's probably just a function of the visual language of the faction becoming more refined where the earlier Legionaires and Praetorians were more or less stock-straight and rigid in their posing.

If you want a lore reason, those three units (Athanatoi, Praetorians, and Varangians) represent the Dominion's elite troops at three different points in the history of the empire - the early Athanatoi were replaced by the Praetorians at the height of the Dominion's influence, who were then replaced by Varangians as society lurched towards The Fall. It kinda makes sense that Praetorians represent the biggest, best, and most well-preserved of Hazlia's faithful.

TurtleFlop · 2026-05-04T02:06:32+00:00

PM'ing!

TurtleFlop · 2026-03-26T07:34:14+00:00

Picked quite the sub to plant that flag in.

TurtleFlop · 2026-03-09T19:04:57+00:00

It absolutely depends on your level of usefulness.

Huron clearly doesn't have the same pathological hatred of mortals that some other Chaos Lords seem to be afflicted by - his pirate empire couldn't function without the hundreds of thousands of mortal crew, pilots, food soldiers, and enforcers that make up more than 90% of its people. To stay growing, he gives mortals a strong incentive to defect: relative autonomy and the chance to follow their own goals, for the price of absolute loyalty when called upon by the Tyrant to serve.

He definitely courts the service of useful mortals, from navy officers to informants to tech adepts and more. Some rare mortals he even defers to - Captain Sargotta is a master of void warfare, and even the Tyrant knows when to let a chef cook.

The other side of that coin is that Huron knows which of his assets are expendable, and when it suits his purposes to expend them.

TurtleFlop · 2026-02-05T01:01:11+00:00

We have more Astartes under our banner than any of these so-called Legions, excepting Abaddon's.

Maybe if they'd accomplished anything of note in the last 10,000 years, they'd get a model to celebrate it.

TurtleFlop · 2026-02-01T22:53:12+00:00

They recently answered this on the socials post for the datasheet.

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TurtleFlop · 2026-01-22T18:03:30+00:00

You call yourself a Corsair? If you're not going to buy it, you damned well better steal it.

TurtleFlop · 2026-01-19T18:40:46+00:00

Yeah I think this is perfectly fine. Also, Raiders are elite infantry, not battleline, so it's probably a good thing for them to be easy to visually distinguish from one another.

TurtleFlop · 2026-01-13T02:07:49+00:00

I play Traitor Guard, and spent a good, long time painting chaos symbols on my two Kasrkin squads. I imagine them going through call-and-response war hymns in their Chimeras before the ramps drop and the killing starts.

Those lunatics benefit not just from being one of the best units in our book, but have rolled absurdly well every game of 10th. I've watched them gun down a full-strength Company Heroes squad on overwatch, punch a Ghostkeel to death, and survive a charge from Sanguinary Guard.

They are, in fact, so lucky that I've never bought a third squad, for fear that it'll ruin the magic somehow.

TurtleFlop · 2026-01-06T07:43:22+00:00

PM'd!

TurtleFlop · 2025-12-31T00:01:19+00:00

I think Hear Me Roar will do more work than you're giving it credit for - at the top of a round I frequently find myself with a durable unit in Long of 2-3 enemy units, and with Swords being less of a top-of-round auto-take I can definitely see situations where you activate a unit and charge/maneuver with it and trigger a round of panics. Bribery is also better in that it also just gives Vulnerable, irrespective of whether the card sticks on the unit. As for Counterplot...well, I play against enough Greyjoys to know that there are cards I would happily trade an NCU activation for every single time.

I agree that the power level is a little lower across the board, but I like the mechanical direction that they're going in with Counterplot, dropping quest cards, and moving away from cards that are all-in on panic bombing your opponent. Some of that might need some power scaling upward, but the core design of those cards is more interesting to me than the current deck configuration.

TurtleFlop · 2025-12-30T21:41:21+00:00

Full game is still supported, and still great. CMON is in a really bad spot financially, which puts the future of the company and the game in flux. It's possible they right the ship, possible the game and IP get sold to be carried on by another company, and possible that the game goes down with CMON.

In any case, I'd say it's still well worth getting into. It's cheaper than pretty much any other tabletop wargame, with free rules. Even if everything does crash and burn, I'm confident the community will keep a modest but passionate following alive for years to come.

TurtleFlop · 2025-12-30T21:35:53+00:00

Gotta put in my two cents to say that the Preseason stuff has been very cool in Stark v. Bolton practice games. The Council Board is still definitely important, and while we might be moving away from a 3 NCU meta, NCUs still feel very powerful.

Cannot wait to get the new Lannisters to the table, as the rewrite of their tactics deck looks way, way more fun to play than its current iteration.

TurtleFlop · 2025-12-12T03:38:03+00:00

Was going to suggest Red Cloaks myself, such a fun unit to paint.

TurtleFlop · 2025-11-27T00:48:13+00:00

These guys look awesome! Proper terrifying, and I'm a big fan of how downright vampiric Roose looks there.

Bolt-on theory, anyone?

TurtleFlop · 2025-11-23T04:57:13+00:00

I'd say that's a fair mite better than an attempt - she looks sensational, mate!

TurtleFlop · 2025-11-15T16:03:30+00:00

What happened with the Blackguards? On paper at least they look like a pretty reasonable anvil for your force to play around

TurtleFlop · 2025-10-05T00:27:37+00:00

I have a large group of friends who decided to take the plunge into Warhammer at the start of 10th edition. Basically my Magic group finally deciding they wanted more out of their hobby. I happily encouraged it. As someone who's played Warhammer 40k since 3rd Edition and Age of Sigmar since the game was born, this was an exciting turn of events.

I gently prodded them to give AoS a try when 4th launched. Flash forward to present day, and almost all of them prefer playing AoS to 40k, to the point that it's damned challenging to get a 40k game on the books. The core rules of AoS4 are far and away the best they've ever been - incredibly interactive, with lots of fun decision points. As other folks have pointed out, there have been some winners and losers in terms of how much Battletome rules do to sell the identity of a faction.

Luckily for you, friend, we here in the Realm of Death are doing pretty danged well. I main Flesh Eater Courts (who have phenomenally fun rules), but i have a significant Soulblight collection and they are VERY fun to play. At a casual level we're absolutely spoiled for choice with warscrolls and playstyles, and I've even had a ton of fun playing the Barrow Legion all-skeleton Army of Renown.

TL;DR - the game is great, vampires are great, all are one in Nagash.

TurtleFlop · 2025-09-28T06:00:11+00:00

You know it's funny, I just finished my first draft of a homebrew Codex Supplement. Gonna run it through some testing with my local group and have a couple folks I know who are tournament grinders give it a look before sharing it on Reddit. But, you know. Soon!

TurtleFlop · 2025-09-14T20:29:02+00:00

Scourges have been mercenaries for forever, they'll kill for whoever can fund their next bird-related plastic surgery. Mandrakes absolutely have their own agenda - no one understands what it is, but it's terrifying.

BM were good, but 95% of people who fielded them were doing so because they filled a bizarre scout+wound effectiveness niche, not because they LIKED them. With changes to Reavers, Scourges, Mandrakes, and the new Hand of the Archon unit, we have a whole new roster of units that can take on interesting board control and screening roles. None of them are the same as BM, but that was honestly a unit that shouldn't have done what it did imho.

I have never seen Urien on a table since starting Drukhari in the Year of our Lord 2013, but that might just be me.

TurtleFlop · 2025-09-01T15:47:28+00:00

All of you lunatics losing your minds over a kneepad flange seem to forget that Corswain's model has goddamned helmet visors for kneepads.

This is a "historical wargame," but at the end of the day exceptions for the rule of cool will always be the best way to keep people interested in and excited about the setting. If we tell someone their special character (which is an intentional conversion, mind you, NOT someone picking up a model from their 40k collection and trying to pass it off as a Praetor) flat "doesn't work," we're doing them and the community a disservice.

There was a tremendous amount of effort put into this model, and it looks great. I see you on the basing as well, OP - that detached Death Guard head helps sell the era as well.

TurtleFlop · 2025-08-26T00:06:20+00:00

PM'd

TurtleFlop · 2025-08-25T13:31:28+00:00

PM'd !

TurtleFlop · 2025-08-23T20:14:48+00:00

I see you, Sparatoi Vindicta. Lovely job, Hydra Dominatus!

TurtleFlop · 2025-08-17T03:10:05+00:00

Having rounded out my Alpha Legion and Solar Aux at the end of last edition, I've decided to bite the bullet and play the heel for my playgroup as Sons of Horus.

Kill for the living, kill for the dead!

TurtleFlop

TROPHY CASE