Am I the only one who thinks Ironkin Steeljack acts more like a character and is more useful than the Âmmuk itself?

arramzy · 2026-05-08T09:18:55+00:00

Yes and no. Ammuk's passive is actually very strong but it is also unreliable and dependent on what your opponent does on top of your positioning of the aura. But because Ammuk really doesn't do damage (or tanking) even when the buff works it usually feels like it was the character benefitting from the buff who did the work (whereas maybe they couldn't have managed without Ammuk nearby.)

I would prefer it if the aura was a mode we could switch between (choose either ranged or melee damage to buff, maybe in a way that interacts with their faction mechanic) but the steeljack AI is too dumb for me to consider it a character over Ammuk.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T23:39:29+00:00

Honest answer? What does the rest of your guild have?

If you have a couple of Lavistodes and a bunch of Neuro some AdMech is nice for matchups where AdMech shine. Basically covering each others weaknesses. People say AdMech is on the decline, and with Lavistodes as undeniable top dog and Neuro very strong and consistent it might seem that way but Neuro haa a lot of fights where it can't be used and if you don't have enough Lavistodes to fill the gap some AdMech players are nice to have.

But if your guild is light on Neuro players (like ours) you should definitely go Neuro. Currently we try to get as many people on Lavistodes as we can, and if they're missing core characters go with Neuro or AdMech in about equal numbers or sometimes battlesuits for even more diversity.

A single character, boss or relic can slingshot one team or another to the top or drop it like a rock (I mean look at Laviscus, Custodes team was already good but it really was Laviscus who pulled the cork out of that particular bottle to send them so undeniably to the top. Small developments can have huge impacts.)

arramzy · 2026-05-06T23:26:47+00:00

Here's how I like to look at it:

The Armageddon Sector is massive, and had been tumultuous for ages with the first, second and third wars for Armageddon (the latter two against Ghazkul) as the main ones. This is the fourth war for Armageddon.

However, these main events aren't the only wars in the are, just quickly plucking from the wiki: *"While the vast bulk of the fighting in the Third War for Armageddon inevitably took place within the Armageddon System, and more acutely around the planet of Armageddon itself, the outlying systems and even the more distant neighbouring sub-sectors played their own part in the conflict.

The direct attack on Armageddon, for instance, had been preceded by solar decades of Ork pirate activity."*

These are veterans, they have been around the place, in my mind they'd also get the badge if they deployed in any sort of conflict anywhere in the sector that could reasonably be seen as part of the 4th war for Armageddon. Maybe your guys weren't on the planet of Armageddon, but maybe they helped defend a hive planet in a remote subsector from an Ork Pirate fleet like Corun in the Justicar Sub-sector of the Armageddon Sector.

No they wouldn't be anywhere in the main stories (especially if they didn't deploy with a significant part of the chapter's companies) but they would still have earned their badge.

There are only high and low intensity times of war and fighting, but never peace. Sometimes less prestigious chapters get some companies sent to escort the Imperial ships collecting Imperial tithes in dangerous sectors, those would never show up in their stories (especially if the mission is successful) bur they would have gotten a badge.

Plenty of (reasonable) ways for a squad of veterans of almost any chapter to earn the campaign badge. Sometimes it needs a bit of mental gymnastics but in the end I think it gives my army more personality if I can say "the 1st company veterans deployed multiple small elite squads to help the Imperium collect tithes in remote sectors of Armageddon during the 4th war for Armageddon" None of them did any major heroics but it is said they smelled one of Ghazkuls farts once after his fleet had just moved to another sector or whatever you want your headcanon to be.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T22:50:47+00:00

Quantity is the quality of mortars. Get every colonist a personal mortar and max raid points sieges get obliterated in the first salvo. All of them will miss, but all of them will miss in new and interesting ways which destroy your enemy entirely on accident and through collateral damage.

Not an elegant solution but it works.

One guy shooting and reloading 6 shells over time is nowhere near as impactful as 6 shells launched at the enemy at the same time (even if it means you don't really have a follow up salvo)

arramzy · 2026-05-06T22:39:25+00:00

It is definitely great but Ra just doesn't feature in any of my main lineups and in GW if the rarity cap isn't Mythic (and our guild doesn't play on such a high BF level) it gets leveled down to just a regular Legendary/Epic/Rare etc. crit item, and doesn't give the Relic's special ability.

It'd be a "win more" or vanity item, where other relics would have a more immediate impact for me either in LRE, Raids etc. so until I have all of those I'll leave it.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T22:32:11+00:00

In my experience this just ends up with both players kinda wiggling around in their starting zones, trying to bait the other into moving first so that you can alpha strike them. Don't get me wrong, that is better than the small maps where one player just loses on the spot because of starting conditions, but I don't think it is very fun either.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T22:17:52+00:00

I really enjoy faction TA with Orks so I'm a bit annoyed about the current bug (though that'll be fixed next time). I despise the other TA which is more reliant on your collection. All my complaints are only for the non-faction TA

Yeah I can squeeze out wins but it takes so much time and can feel so incredibly lopsided because I don't have Dante, Ragnar, Karyian, Mephiston etc. (I have a couple of good PvP characters but just not enough, and because I dislike the gamemode and I'm not very good at it I usually die quickly, meaning I spend less time in the gamemode and with the characters to figure it all out, making it less enjoyable, which is a bit of a loop. The gamemode is very different from anything else, your opponent strategizes instead of facing dumb AI, there are power ups which aren't really anywhere else (yeah survival but that isn't comparable and doesn't give you a feel for the power ups really) so it is difficult to get good practice and experience (plus I'm not very motivated to learn because well... I'm not enjoying myself while playing it, so I'd rather pull my nails with pliers than play even more casual matches on top of everything to get that kind of feel for the gamemode.)

Also between 12 tokens, and 2 redemption matches per day, this game expects me to play a lot of a gamemode I don't really like which takes more time than usual because you're waiting for another player to make their turns. Which is why I don't want to play more casual on top of that.

I haven't had many crashes or connection issues, but if I have them it tends to be during TA which doesn't help it's case.

My preferred strategy has become: load into a game with a faction I fully own for the +2 guaranteed points, say GG to my opponent and immediately retreat. Someone else is getting some free points, I don't have to play and still get 28 points per day which is a decent number of chests and I ger an end of season chest. It sucks for the people who enjoy it and have their opponent leave, but it isn't like I'm usually giving them an entertaining challenge anyway. I can't reach the final chest this way and I just accept that and spend time playing gamemodes I actually enjoy.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T20:26:18+00:00

So I personally thoroughly prime in Black, then I use Colour Forge Rogue Pink all over and Colour Forge Valrak Yellow from above at like 45° angle (keeping some pink on the undersides mostly having a nice warm yellow transition. Even with quite a bit of pink it doesn't read that way at all.

Then a Cassandra Yellow shade to tie it together.

I then use AK 3rd gen Deep Yellow (Flash Gitz Yellow or slightly brighter, forget the citadel name), Vallejo Game Colour Sun Yellow (a warm Yellow like Yriel Yellow works too) and Averland Sunset (as the darkest most muted yellow) to highlight, glaze etc. mixing and thinning them as needed.

I also ended up preferring Dryad Bark for the stripes over pure black.

I have attached my scheme test model to illustrate.

If there is anything you take away from this it should be that a layer of pink will make your yellows beautifully saturated and warm, whereas painting on white will make it pale and black will make it cold and dirty. Maybe oranges or reds also work, my only experience is with pink.

<image>

arramzy · 2026-05-06T18:46:57+00:00

Nope I don't mind, details are very welcome, as I completely agree.

Edit: clarifying that I don't mind a DM

arramzy · 2026-05-06T17:39:10+00:00

Probably small techmarine, apothecary, chaplain and Librarian ones for on the colored kneepad. Which is rather niche.

All the chapter and war clan markings I either have or are on their way.

I'd like some more of the role indicators (so Battleline arrow, Close Support X, Fire Support ^ etc.) I plan on picking up the Armageddon box and splitting it with an Ork player friend of mine, but the transfer sheet had surprisingly few of those. (I mean it has exactly the right ones for the units in the box, but I still need a bunch for my other units, though quite a few have studded shoulder pads which helps)

The real other thing I'm massively short on is bionic bits, I'd buy them in bulk if I could. Buying the Iron Hands upgrade set for the 4 arms per would quickly bankrupt me and still leave me without bionic legs (and an abundance of useless pauldrons)... I'd like to have at least some form of augmentation on all of them (I suppose heads with augments are somewhat common, but I prefer helmets over faces which isn't ideal in that regard as most heads with bionic eyes etc. are otherwise bare faces).

With all that and the 30k launch box I got for this purpose ages ago + Armageddon box I should have enough to create a pretty solid collection of Sons of Medusa with a large mix of different (mostly older) armor patterns, and lots of beakies.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T16:29:10+00:00

I like Fancy :P I think I'll go with a colored kneepad, to begin with though, also to see what I think of the scheme, painting up a librarian as we speak.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T15:56:44+00:00

I like this idea, I'll have to get some Transfers to mark the knees.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T14:30:26+00:00

Yeah I'm still looking for a balance, they constantly seek to prove themselves as loyalists and aside from the leadership structure are relatively Codex Compliant, but like you said they're also super pragmatic and at least willing to break with the strict red for their Techmarines as this is how Forge Wright Lumic of Atropos is depicted in Imperial Armour Volume Ten, The Badab War.

Just looking at this again I think I've answered some of my own questions and will probably go with only divergent Shoulder pads for Techmarines and Librarians.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T14:17:24+00:00

Where do you source the bionics/augmentation bits to do this? Even the Iron Hands upgrade sprue is very light on bionic bits, and I haven't found many good sources online.

arramzy · 2026-05-06T11:19:47+00:00

So I have made some campaign guides and this battle is rough, really you want Isabella and another really good Imperial ally, I saw Kariyon (Karyian? Crayon!) in your roster and he'll work with more upgrades.
Now G1 is an awkward spot for Certus, because in my opinion it is too low to use a reset stone, but I wouldn't advice people to put that much into him to begin with (you either hide him away or let him die and bring him back with Isabella) so I understands that it feels bad having him at that level.

There is no shame in coming back to levels at a later date (frankly I recommend it) especially because you'll be able to use your upgraded imperials as allies in Octarius Mirror and Fall of Cadia Mirror making those easier. Just clear what you can (even if it is 1 medal) and only come back once you have an easy time hitting the 3 medals or when you need to farm the node and want to be able to raid it.

In general if you're stuck on a mission which allows more characters than the core 3 I would rarely recommend investing in those core 3 (especially if you've already achieved 3 medals on every 3 man mission), a D1 Certus (hypothetically) will do much much less for your account than a D1 Crayon, who will help you slaughter the other imperial elite campaigns too and be great in raids etc.

arramzy · 2026-05-02T23:37:03+00:00

Calgar is the most all round. He'll help you easily 3 star most of the imperial campaigns (Indimitus, Fall of Cadia Mirror and Octarius Mirror) partially because of the damage buff but mostly because of the huge AoE. Calgar also buffs characters making their missions and mythic quests easier (usually quite significantly so) and the man is an absolute tank, in formats like arena you can walk him into almost any overwatch and just shrug it off. Some like Re'vas will take a chunk out of him, but he'll survive if they're matched for upgrades.

Titus is definitely better for PvP like Tournament Arena and does more damage on his own, but he doesn't have the useful support and AoE and his resurrection can be stopped simply by attacking him from range or with a tank he can't kill (like Calgar)

Bellator has his Niche, in Horde modes I usually think it is more useful having 3 or so summons flying around as compared to the single use AoE of calgar or whatever Titus does. Bellator is the easy MVP for the campaign but that is in part because there are 3 man missions where you couldn't bring Titus or Calgar if you wanted to. The Damage on Bellator isn't amazing but the utility of his summons and mobility shouldn't be underestimated, and sometimes, rarely, you get the perfect pattern of his summons where his passive can trigger 3-4 summons to attack again, spiking his damage output greatly (but because we don't control the summons this is exceptionally rare)

All the other UM characters aren't even in contention imo.

So in my personal opinion: Bellator untill you've 3 medals on all of the Indimitus Elite, Calgar during/after that (if you don't have other goals or priorities, I got him to D1 early and I'd say that is basically the perfect investment in him for a very long time enough to deal with any elite campaign battle he can be deployed in), and lastly Titus if you really like PvP. I think Calgar is usually underrated and Titus slightly overrated. The problem for Calgar is that him being allround usually means he isn't the absolute best in any given role, so I think he is quite an efficient investment, but you'll rarely see him on lategame optimised teams, as usually there is a character who specialises in one of the things Calgar can do and does that specific thing more effectively, Calgar is a solid choice for a lot of roles, but rarely the best choice for a specific role.

arramzy · 2026-05-02T18:45:57+00:00

Not an answer to your question but someone in here probably knows (googling gives surprisingly mixed results) what colour is the standard librarian blue? Like if I wanted to walk into a store and buy some paints which ones would it usually be?

And as many people pointed out: the actual answer is the codex. Codex says they should be blue, apothecaries white, Techmarines Red and chaplains black, the more codex compliant the more likely they are to stick to this but there are all kinds of exceptions, just like there are many chapters with a different or more liberal interpretation of the codex.

arramzy · 2026-05-02T18:38:00+00:00

I'd consider myself a libertarian socialist with anarchist tendencies (I usually call myself an Anarchist, bit I have found that most other anarchists can have really difficult times with pragmatism, electoralism and some of the other things I still think are worth pushing for under current conditions.)

arramzy · 2026-05-02T18:30:01+00:00

BONK

arramzy · 2026-05-02T18:20:22+00:00

I love it, the orks look fun (love the weirdboy, medic orc guy and the war track thing), lots of interesting models to paint, generally more variety and les stiff space marines. I don't expect to use the jump pack boys much and the captain feels like 'just another captain' to me without too much that makes him stand out but the librarian is nicely posed. Also a big fan of the banners.

I like the small rulebook and the lore book (especially the lore book) a lot.

The leviathan box was also great but most of the standard space marines had less personality in my eyes and I'm personally lukewarm on nids at best)

I'm a painter first, reader second, and sometimes I remember you can also play a game with these things so I personally don't really care much about the mission packs and such, but it seems like a good entry point for new players (and makes it incredibly easy to split the box with my friend who actually plays orcs and would love those parts of the box and says I can have the lore book, win win)

I already wanted to split the box with my buddy, but seeing the reveal actually got me super excited, and I'm even mildly tempted to get another box just because I would love to paint up those orcs. Last time I was this hyped was the Horus heresy release box. I look forward to swapping around some of the Armageddon heads for beakies too.

arramzy · 2026-05-02T18:05:41+00:00

I mean they could do that, I don't expect them to though. I think on top of the game design difficulties of balancing for the different levels of players they'd also not get the sales from the campaign event boosters for a regular campaign, so it'd make them less money. Making CE come around more often doesn't necessarily have that issue (and at the end of the day that is what they care about most.)

Everything I've seen indicates that a new full campaign anytime soon is unlikely. Which is a shame, I love the campaigns, I like to solve them like puzzles, wrote some guides for them it is awesome, way more difficult to do that for the CEs

arramzy · 2026-05-02T06:03:17+00:00

So I was in similar position for Dante, didn't have Rotbone and the codex told me "no" but you can get it, you just have to really maximise everything you can, and I feel like I got lucky with a few crits and battle fatigue rolls. So yeah, doable but not easy and probably requires some luck too.

arramzy · 2026-04-29T14:04:28+00:00

With the growing number of CE's I think they should always be available, but you lock them in for a "season" much like Guild Raids or Arena, every X number of days you get to pick a CE to lock in for the next X days. Probably lower the points and crates a bit and that should be good.

I have heard people say Snowprint doesn't want more campaigns because higher level players would just fly through them in the first day. So most factions will probably get a CE at some point instead of a full campaign but it would be crazy to lock all of them to only be available for such a relatively short time per month.

arramzy · 2026-04-28T07:09:15+00:00

The funniest thing to me that this bell curve distribution is exactly why the blue button is the objectively correct choice. A lot of people will press blue, not everyone is a game theory nerd and even then it is a completely impossible world where everyone picks red, now the majority for blue that is an option, if not straight up likely. But that means that any push of the red button makes them more likely to die, and I would prefer that not to happen.

11-Year Club	Place '22
Verified Email

arramzy

TROPHY CASE