Why Pay Premium Points for Bad Units in 40k?

By Wesley Floyd | September 21st, 2018 | Categories: Editorials, Warhammer 40k

There seems to be a disturbing pattern we’ve been noticing with the points cost of units in 8th edition. Take a look at these comparisons and see.

8th edition has been the arguably the most popular edition of 40k to exist. It’s been extremely FAQ-heavy and there are new releases around every corner. With that being said, has GW lost track of their point-scaling in the process?

Why Pay Premium Points for Bad Units in 40k?

Poor, Poor Land Raider

The Land Raider used to be one of the star units of 7th edition that could cause headaches for your opponent. They got even more brutal at low-point games. Moving into 8th edition, the Land Raider looks decent on paper. T8 with 16 wounds and a 2+ save means it’ll be sticking around (In theory).

What makes the Land Raider ugly is its cost. Let’s take a look at a couple of variants and how many points you have to sink into them to get the bare-bones version.

Land Raider Crusader: 308 pts
Land Raider (Las Cannons): 356 pts

These take up a Heavy Support slot so you can throw it into almost any detachment you want. You really shouldn’t be needing more than one Land Raider anyway.

Now let’s look at what you can get for around the same points.

Roboute Guilliman: 400 pts
Knight Gallant: 354 Pts

Okay… WHAT? The Gallant is actually cheaper than the Land Raider Crusader. The Gallant just got it’s own codex which means stratagem support. It can also run across the board turn one and do over 24 damage hitting on 2’s.

The Land Raider can move 10″, shoot 4 shots that may just backfire by doing a random D6 damage, and has no invulnerable save.

We really don’t even need to break down Robbie G. For 50 points more, you get an untarget-able Primarch Badass that rerolls everything and dishes out mortal wounds.

Think the Land Raider just drew the short straw in 8th edition? Let’s look at another example.

Dreadnought & Armigers

Looking at the Death Company Dreadnought, for example, the cheapest you can get him is 159 pts.

For that, you’re looking at five attacks on the charge at S12 rerolling all failed hits and three damage flat. Not bad when you read that without comparing it to anything.

But let’s take a look at those new-fangled Armigers that just came out.

Armiger Warglaive 164 pts
Armiger Helverin 174 pts

For a handful of points more, you get a 12 wound model that can move 14″, still shoot, and charge. It’s got all the stratagem support in the world and has an invulnerable save.

Depending on what variant you take, you can bring a sniper rifle meltagun with a three flat damage chainsword. Or two autocannons that do three flat damage.

The power creep between those two units is astronomical.

Paying Premium Points for Battlefield Roles?

If you didn’t recognize the pattern here, all of the units that were better in every way happen to be Lords of War. So why are there worse units out there for almost the same points cost?

The only thing we can conclude is that GW expects people to pay more points to fill out battlefield roles in detachments. It’s either that or their point calculating algorithm is completely jacked up.

What do you think it the cause of these insane power difference per point? Has GW just decided to neglect older models? Do you think it’s worth it to pay more points for a unit to fill out a detachment?

Let us know in the comments of our Facebook Hobby Group.