Did you know that the Leagues of Votann are James Workshop’s new favourite army? This might explain a few things…
There’s been a lot of talk about the latest faction to hit Warhammer 40,000 lately. It’s super-exciting to see a whole new civilisation in the game, bringing new rules, new lore, and an amazing new range of miniatures.
However, now that players have the codex in their hands, we know there’s some concern that the army is too powerful compared with other forces in the game.
That’s not good.
We never want anyone to feel like their games won’t be fun or fair, nor that the outcome is set even before a die is rolled. We’ve gone back to have a look at them again, and there are indeed a few places where rules interactions are too powerful, or units are too cheap in points for what they do.
How Did This Happen?
Warhammer 40,000 is a big, complex game with lots of factors to account for, and codexes are usually written and sent off for printing a good few months ahead of publication. In practice, this means it’s not always clear what kind of competitive environment a new book will drop into. In this instance, the army was tested against other recent books like Aeldari and Tyranids – many of which have seen their own increases in points and rules adjustments since their release to align with the wider game.
We've got a devoted rules team, and an amazing group of playtesters, but even after a rigorous testing period, sometimes we miss things that a passionate world-wide community of hundreds of thousands will quickly spot.
We’re sorry we didn’t get these rules right out of the gate.
And we’ll fix it.
What Are The Changes?
To start off, we are updating a few rules now, ahead of the main Leagues of Votann miniatures release, so players know what they're getting for their points and can plan accordingly. We wouldn’t want you to buy a full 2,000-point army only to find that it no longer fits the updated rules.
We’ve kept the changes pretty simple, with two key updates.
1. There’s an increase in points for units across the army.
2. We’re changing the way that Judgement Tokens work, so that hits benefiting from them no longer count as an automatic 6 to wound.
These changes will appear in the official Warhammer 40,000 app shortly, while you can download the update here:
The Leagues of Votann will still be a very powerful force even after these changes – but hopefully not one that stomps its way to an easy victory in every game. For players going up against them, they do have weaknesses you can exploit – they aren’t fast, and they tend to have limited and predictable threat ranges. You’ll still find them formidable opponents, just as they should be.
As ever, the Warhammer studio will keep a close eye on the results of upcoming games and tournaments, as well as feedback from players. If you ever have any specific rules questions you’d like answered you can send them to 40kFAQ@gwplc.com.