In the third installment of lore, we get to see what types of weapons the Leagues of Votann use and where they come from!
They really have to build up the lore side of things with a new faction, and we love to see it. From all of this, it looks like GW is trying to push the Leagues away from their more normal human Imperial counterparts. Plus, they also mention their link to the Tau this time around!
If you haven’t caught on yet, its probably worth mentioning that Votan (one “n”) is another name for Odin and a few other gods throughout history, so maybe that’s where GW grabbed some of their inspiration(s) for this faction.
Warhammer Community unveiled the new lore, but we’ll also look at the second portion that we saw recently.
GW Reveals That the Leagues of Votann are Clones!
The Kin may not know much about their earliest days, but there are certain articles of lost history deemed indisputable, known as “First Truths”. One such principle is that the First Ancestors departed their original homeworld – almost certainly pre-Imperial Terra – millennia ago, aboard vast fleets of generation ships. It is also deemed to be true that these Ancestors set out as prospectors, miners, and void-dredgers, charged with exploiting the riches of the heavens.
The eventual fate of the First Ancestors is uncertain, for Kin myth solidifies into intelligible history only after the long-march fleets began to arrive at their destinations near the galactic core. The records of this period boast the last references to the First Ancestors – and the earliest mentions of the Ancestor Cores.
This makes sense with the new Necromunda Divergent Ironhead Squats Prospectors minis we just saw, as they are some of the only dedicated miners left out there.
Likewise, it is a First Truth that the Kin have been a cloned people from the very start.
The First Ancestors are held responsible for the cloneskeins – the systems of stable mutations that underpin the entire genetic structure of the Kin to this day. The gene pool drawn upon by the Leagues of Votann is stable, deep, and varied – this is no race of identical clones. In practical terms, the cloneskeins have produced a species with denser bones and muscles than baseline humans, higher red and white blood cell counts, and formidable strength and resilience.
It’s quite interesting to think that the Leagues of Votann are all clones of some sort, but not from the same source, from all the different first ancestors out there.
Such was the craft of the First Ancestors that even Kin souls are engineered – they shine more dimly against the tides of the warp than their distant human cousins, with no evidence of uncontrolled psychic mutation. Indeed, only those with the appropriate psychically active cloneskein can activate the so-called barrier-tech the Kin employ to access the empyrean.
Cloneskeins differentiate the division of labour in Kin society, and impart useful abilities on those who possess them. Some Kin might have enhanced reaction times, the ability to see the infrared spectrum, or limited resistance to cosmic radiation and extremes of temperature or gravity. Many cloneskeins manifest in visible fashion, with giveaways including distinctive bodily odours, unusual eye colours, or thick subdermal layers. Such physical variations would be a cause for concern in Imperial society – but to the Kin, they are a badge of honour.
It would make sense then that your heroes and characters could actually be bigger as that could be a mutation, or with this, it opens the possibility for some very interesting special rules!
The Leagues of Votann Weapons are Ancient STLs!
As with more or less everything else in the Leagues, the collected technological knowledge of the Kin is contained within the Votann. These ancient minds are vast repositories of weapon schematics that would have just about every member of the Adeptus Mechanicus weighing up the merits of becoming a heretek. As with more or less everything else in the Leagues, the collected technological knowledge of the Kin is contained within the Votann. These ancient minds are vast repositories of weapon schematics that would have just about every member of the Adeptus Mechanicus weighing up the merits of becoming a heretek. The Kin, you see, are sitting on a closely guarded network of functioning STCs – a fact reflected across their entire armoury.
Click Here To Get The New Sci-Fi Ruler Miniature!
An armoury which, mark you, they are perfectly permitted to improve over time. The Kin may move slowly, but they’re not stuck in technological stasis like some factions we could mention. Their engineers – called Brôkhyrs – command the auto-foundries of each Kin hold from their personal A.N-vyl terminals. But what are they forging?
So STCs or Standard Template Construct are basically files that can be used to fabricate pretty much anything a colony needed in the world they were settling on. For the most part, they were lost since the exploratory fleets set out from Terra millennia ago, and the Mechanicum guards any shreds of data found.
They are basically the evolution of 3d printing’s STL files that we know in real life…
It’s also nice to know that even though The Kin move slowly, they still improve. This gives the Games Workshop studio a lot of room to give them really cool weapons over time.
Weapon Types
From the Autoch-pattern bolter to the Etacarn plasma gun, many Kin weapons bear superficial similarities to Imperial weapons, but they’re superior in every respect. There’s a clear shared ancestry between the bolt revolver and bolt shotgun and the bolt weapons of the Adeptus Astartes, but Kin weapons simply work better and hit harder.
A Bolt Shotgun sounds quite deadly, not to mention their other forms of bolt weaponry that the Astartes don’t have. They say they hit harder and work better, so maybe they get more Strength, AP, or Damage? It would be interesting to see how strong they will make the bolt weapons.
Then there are items like the volkanite disintegrators, which use technology since lost to the Imperium, or ion technology, which is proscribed by the Adeptus Mechanicus. That’s their loss – the T’au Empire certainly seemed to appreciate being taught how to harness it…
This could be the most interesting part of all the lore! First, it points to possible Men of Iron, and a link between the Tau, Men of Iron, and the fact that the Leagues showed them how to make weapons!
We heard rumblings about this, but GW basically just confirmed it, so who knows what type of allegiance(s) they will have in tabletop 40k.
All these weapons are supported by smart tech integrated into Kin battlegear. The haptic utility nerve transmission recalibrator modules – HunTR for short – interface with their neural augmetics to establish a feedback loop between firearms and their users. This system projects minute gravitational pulses to maintain a stable firing platform even while running at full pelt – or zooming along on a flying trike.
The Graviton Blast Cannon and SP Conversion Beamer look like some serious weaponry! They didn’t say much about their power, but that, combined with their HunTR tech, could lead to some insane shooting units.
If you love everything Squats, check out the latest on the new Leagues of Votann below.
- New 40k Squats Leagues of Votann Rules & Rumors
- Leagues of Votaan Squat Trikes Are Back!
- What the New ‘Votann’ Are in Warhammer 40k
- Leagues of Votann Miniatures & Rumors
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About the Author: Travis Pasch
Travis Pasch
Job Title: Head Writer & Editor
Socials: @paschbass
About Travis Pasch: Travis has been a Warhammer 40k hobbyist since the 1990s, playing the game since Third Edition. Through extensive traveling, he’s seen a lot of the miniatures hobby from across the world, giving him a unique perspective on the latest gaming topics and trends.
Travis’s brother even owns a commission painting studio, where he’s picked up a lot of good advice and techniques for painting Warhammer and tabletop miniatures over the years, as well. Travis joined the Spikey Bits team in 2019 and has been the lead writer since 2020.
Currently, he’s working on converting all his 40k Adeptus Mechanicus models and becoming a true tech enjoyer, complete with both sad and happy robot noises!
