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Warhammer 40,000 - 8th Edition #Army Codex
Codex Imperial Knights
Rules supplement for Warhammer 40,000 covering the Imperial Knights faction. Includes units, strategems, objectives and rules lists.
120 pages, Hardcover
Published June 1, 2018
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33 people want to read
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Games Workshop
1,012 books108 followersGames Workshop Group PLC (often abbreviated as GW) is a British miniature wargaming manufacturing company. Games Workshop is best known as developer and publisher of the tabletop wargames Warhammer, Warhammer 40,000 and The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game.
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June 24, 2018
Of all the factions being updated, the Imperial Knights were easily among the most prominent which needed to be examined. Ignoring both the fact that they were getting plenty of shiny new toys, and enough units to field an individual army, their lore made them stand out. This was a group (well, groups) which had endured the fall of the original human empire covering the galaxy. They were the best suited to wait out the Warp storms which followed and adapt to whatever Chaos threw at them, as the Imperium was split in two and everything fell to pieces. As such, it left the door open to no small number of story opportunities, ideas and even new stories. These groups have had no shortage of questing knights, crusaders or participants in larger war efforts as well. Out of all the Imperial factions - save perhaps the Cadians - they were the most open to new stories or developments.
Did it live up to these hopes? Well, judge for yourself as we covered the best and worst of the book.
The Good
The previous Imperial Knights codices have been a mixed bunch in terms of lore. The original was a gold standard for Imperial factions, while the second squandered a lot of what had been introduced in that book. As such, this Edition's codex needed to both adapt to a brand new setting while simultaneously repairing what had been done with the prior release. You can actually see this from the very start as, while it doesn't fully step back from some ideas, it tries to at least correct them.
The obvious big one here stems from a singular - almost universal - alteration to the initial opening. We have a single magnificent two-page spread with some minor text, depicting the Knights in battle. It's the sort of hyper-detailed and extravagant depiction we have come to see countless times over, and it never fails to help impress on new readers the capabilities of the army they are buying. For anyone else, it helps to show off the new units added in, such as the mini-Warlord Titan we have now. Previously, that would have been it, perhaps with a paragraph or two added into the side somewhere. Thankfully, that's not the case this time. Instead, it promptly opens up into a full five-page piece introducing the army.
The pages themselves are broken up into a number of key components, starting with a general description of the army, how it is viewed and the approach it takes on the battlefield. Also, to a lesser degree how it is regarded by the rest of the Imperium. Following that, it outlines their full history and how they were established. It's an old concept that most people know by this point, and while certainly much shorter than previous outings, it does a better job of incorporating certain elements from the pre-Imperium era. For example, details and ideas surrounding how the worlds were established were skimmed over here. We lack some of the finer details shown there and how they handled certain aspects of constructing settlements or mining resources. That's irritating, but nothing too terrible. In its place, there's a greater focus placed on how they became archaic, regarded as backward "quaint" settlements left to their own devices, and were largely laughed at. Yet, most pressingly, it details that this sort of thing is exactly why they survived:
"The Knight worlds became ever more conservative and insular. They rejected advances in human technology and were slowly sidelined. They became a source of amusement to the intellectually and culturally superior masses of Humanity. Ironically, it was the Knight worlds' very isolationist nature and refusal to adopt new technologies that would protect them from the horrific apocalypse that devastated the rest of Mankind.
[...]
humanity's fall was swift and terrible. Emergent psykers drowned worlds in warp storms and daemonic incursions. Thinking machines carried out genocidal purges. Gene-wars buried entire star systems beneath writhing tides of fleshy abominations.
The Knight worlds had burned their psykers as witches. They had turned away the thinking machines, citing the value of hard labour and a distrust of artificial intelligence. They had left their genetics untouched. Now, they had stoked their watchfires, bolstered their defenses and simply endured."
Personally, I like this as it helps to further enforce just why the galaxy is such a hellhole, and why the Imperium could so easily slide into becoming a dystopia. Many fans, old and new, tend to forget that the more forgiving or progressive elements were wiped out during this era, and ironically it was the more backward "burn the witch!" mobs who endured thanks to their isolationism. Combined with the events of the Horus Heresy, and the xenos incursions, and it's a miracle anything good did truly survive. It's a good reminder of how the thematic rules of this setting tend to work, and just what can end up becoming entrenched in societies thanks to the hellish nature of the universe.
The sections also downplay a few points I was previously critical of, such as trying to express all Knights as being utterly irreplaceable machines. This was often contradicted and undermined the very role of the Mechanicus in the Knight worlds. So, while it makes it clear that the systems are rare elements of technology, it doesn't beat this idea continually into the reader's head. Yet, it even pushes to counter the "relic" argument but citing how the technology has been adapted in multiple ways, or reverse engineered to create helms which pilot the smaller knights now featured in the codex. It's a nice link, as well as a sign of evolution within the faction, along with how their mechanics - the Mechanicus aligned Sacristans, are treated. The codex even takes the time to fill in a few gaps, while also incorporating elements from the novels, such as the mobile repair/maintenance platforms used to make sure the knights are constantly combat ready.
The subject of how certain knights are aligned more to themselves or the Imperium while others are closer to the Mechanicus naturally comes up. Yet, there's definitely a far better attempt to integrate and separate the two than past efforts, especially in how the latter relates to the Mechanicus or Titan Legions. Each are given a page to flesh out their details, and to expand on how their worlds operate, along with just how some knights can become permanently seconded to a legion. Yet, rather than completely stripping away their identity, it tries to take the time to better establish that they retain much of their pride and defining qualities thanks to the deeply ingrained character traits of their dynasties. It's a good thing to have, as it allows the army to still retain its own prominence, identity, and concepts rather than simply being reduced to lackeys.
Much of the book also carries an undercurrent of diversifying the worlds themselves over the harmonization we saw in the previous book. This is evident at every point, as they discuss how they treat outsiders, the worlds vary or their Sacristans are treated as everything from necessary Mechanicus spies to loyal members of the households. This even extends to the dynasties themselves, as it's noted matriarchies are roughly as prominent as patriarchies, and there's no end to what traditions or societies could be formed from them. So, you could easily end up fielding a fleet of Celtic themed mecha warriors who worship the Emperor as the undying guardian of the elements, and it would work, for example. This isn't explicitly highlighted at any point, but the constant reminders are enough to give this book some much-needed life and variety.
The timeline itself is also fairly good. While it does admittedly suffer from very short and fleeting citations during much of the initial timeline, this improves considerably as it goes along. Besides a possible doomsday scenario - and expect an article on that quite soon - it helps to further establish how the two groups differ considerably from one another. A particular highlight is how a death-obsessed Knight world approaches a Tyranid Splinter Fleet invading their world, and their entire reaction to the event. Even without this, however, it also continually pushes to further expand on how knights are recruited or offer suggestions on just how the new ranks are implemented within their armies. There's a hierachy here, but there's enough of a general description offered to help give players ideas.
The bad, meanwhile, is a short but important part on here.
The Bad
The issue with the negative points within the army doesn't surround where they failed so much as what they didn't fix. For example, the big one notable from the very start is the incredible amount of padding in the second half of the book. Pages upon pages of enlarged photographs, or vast images of knights with minimal text are offered up, dominating huge chunks of the codex, while offering very little actual content. You could honestly narrow it down into perhaps a third of the space by downsizing a few repeated basic colour scheme images, and you wouldn't lose anything. What's especially frustrating about this is that the book even does this during the final half, where it compressed multiple examples of Freeblades together. Even then, this segment is only a small fraction of the size of the usual one, so it honestly comes across as if it was shunted in at the last second when it honestly just needed a general reworking of the parts prior to it.
Another definite problem with the book is that a few of its overall depictions of events, details and ideas tend to be quite nebulous. Yes, anything which can offer fans more fodder for their own creations is always welcome, but there needs to be something definitive. The few knight houses who end up getting a moment in the spotlight don't offer up anything more than a few basic and very generic concepts. There's nothing fully fleshed out about them, and it lacks something for fans to really use an identity as a defining starting point for their armies. Furthermore, because of this, most descriptions of Knight worlds tend to be very general. We are given enough to know that they vary considerably in nature, design and environment, but that's it. Unlike the descriptions of Macragge, Fenris or others, it's all something generalized and inserted into a single sentence.
Yet, perhaps the most irritating part still is how it doesn't do anything truly noteworthy with the new status quo. The best we get is the aforementioned doomsday possibility and a tantalizing mention that Mechanicus systems have been fortified within the great rift, creating small pocket Imperiums within the Warp storms. Yet, besides that, it's unfortunately just business as usual for this lot. There needed to be much more offered up to the army, something to help push the overall timeline or story forward within the book and show how events have been influenced. Without it, there's little to really help indicate that things have truly changed.
These sound like very short segments, but you need to keep in mind that these are obvious and quite evident problems. I can't break down or fully detail the problems with each, as there's little to no detail to actually work with. It's more of a case that so much of it is barely in the book rather than anything else.
The Artwork
The artwork here is good, but it heavily relies on reused pieces from the past. while we are offered a small number of new works here and there, almost all of it is stuff we saw in the first codex. This isn't to say that it's bad by any means, or even that it's unpleasant to look at, but it's difficult to say that there shouldn't have been more here.
The Verdict
This one is very mixed indeed. It's a perfect case of taking two steps forward and then one back, failing to fully build on what other novels had set up for it. There's certainly nothing truly criminal about it, nothing stupid and no true blind spots (as we even get a few character bits for Freeblades) but it just doesn't make the leap needed to work within this new altered universe. So, it's good on the whole, but unambitious, unfortunately.
So, that's the lore done. Next time, we'll be moving onto the rules.
Did it live up to these hopes? Well, judge for yourself as we covered the best and worst of the book.
The Good
The previous Imperial Knights codices have been a mixed bunch in terms of lore. The original was a gold standard for Imperial factions, while the second squandered a lot of what had been introduced in that book. As such, this Edition's codex needed to both adapt to a brand new setting while simultaneously repairing what had been done with the prior release. You can actually see this from the very start as, while it doesn't fully step back from some ideas, it tries to at least correct them.
The obvious big one here stems from a singular - almost universal - alteration to the initial opening. We have a single magnificent two-page spread with some minor text, depicting the Knights in battle. It's the sort of hyper-detailed and extravagant depiction we have come to see countless times over, and it never fails to help impress on new readers the capabilities of the army they are buying. For anyone else, it helps to show off the new units added in, such as the mini-Warlord Titan we have now. Previously, that would have been it, perhaps with a paragraph or two added into the side somewhere. Thankfully, that's not the case this time. Instead, it promptly opens up into a full five-page piece introducing the army.
The pages themselves are broken up into a number of key components, starting with a general description of the army, how it is viewed and the approach it takes on the battlefield. Also, to a lesser degree how it is regarded by the rest of the Imperium. Following that, it outlines their full history and how they were established. It's an old concept that most people know by this point, and while certainly much shorter than previous outings, it does a better job of incorporating certain elements from the pre-Imperium era. For example, details and ideas surrounding how the worlds were established were skimmed over here. We lack some of the finer details shown there and how they handled certain aspects of constructing settlements or mining resources. That's irritating, but nothing too terrible. In its place, there's a greater focus placed on how they became archaic, regarded as backward "quaint" settlements left to their own devices, and were largely laughed at. Yet, most pressingly, it details that this sort of thing is exactly why they survived:
"The Knight worlds became ever more conservative and insular. They rejected advances in human technology and were slowly sidelined. They became a source of amusement to the intellectually and culturally superior masses of Humanity. Ironically, it was the Knight worlds' very isolationist nature and refusal to adopt new technologies that would protect them from the horrific apocalypse that devastated the rest of Mankind.
[...]
humanity's fall was swift and terrible. Emergent psykers drowned worlds in warp storms and daemonic incursions. Thinking machines carried out genocidal purges. Gene-wars buried entire star systems beneath writhing tides of fleshy abominations.
The Knight worlds had burned their psykers as witches. They had turned away the thinking machines, citing the value of hard labour and a distrust of artificial intelligence. They had left their genetics untouched. Now, they had stoked their watchfires, bolstered their defenses and simply endured."
Personally, I like this as it helps to further enforce just why the galaxy is such a hellhole, and why the Imperium could so easily slide into becoming a dystopia. Many fans, old and new, tend to forget that the more forgiving or progressive elements were wiped out during this era, and ironically it was the more backward "burn the witch!" mobs who endured thanks to their isolationism. Combined with the events of the Horus Heresy, and the xenos incursions, and it's a miracle anything good did truly survive. It's a good reminder of how the thematic rules of this setting tend to work, and just what can end up becoming entrenched in societies thanks to the hellish nature of the universe.
The sections also downplay a few points I was previously critical of, such as trying to express all Knights as being utterly irreplaceable machines. This was often contradicted and undermined the very role of the Mechanicus in the Knight worlds. So, while it makes it clear that the systems are rare elements of technology, it doesn't beat this idea continually into the reader's head. Yet, it even pushes to counter the "relic" argument but citing how the technology has been adapted in multiple ways, or reverse engineered to create helms which pilot the smaller knights now featured in the codex. It's a nice link, as well as a sign of evolution within the faction, along with how their mechanics - the Mechanicus aligned Sacristans, are treated. The codex even takes the time to fill in a few gaps, while also incorporating elements from the novels, such as the mobile repair/maintenance platforms used to make sure the knights are constantly combat ready.
The subject of how certain knights are aligned more to themselves or the Imperium while others are closer to the Mechanicus naturally comes up. Yet, there's definitely a far better attempt to integrate and separate the two than past efforts, especially in how the latter relates to the Mechanicus or Titan Legions. Each are given a page to flesh out their details, and to expand on how their worlds operate, along with just how some knights can become permanently seconded to a legion. Yet, rather than completely stripping away their identity, it tries to take the time to better establish that they retain much of their pride and defining qualities thanks to the deeply ingrained character traits of their dynasties. It's a good thing to have, as it allows the army to still retain its own prominence, identity, and concepts rather than simply being reduced to lackeys.
Much of the book also carries an undercurrent of diversifying the worlds themselves over the harmonization we saw in the previous book. This is evident at every point, as they discuss how they treat outsiders, the worlds vary or their Sacristans are treated as everything from necessary Mechanicus spies to loyal members of the households. This even extends to the dynasties themselves, as it's noted matriarchies are roughly as prominent as patriarchies, and there's no end to what traditions or societies could be formed from them. So, you could easily end up fielding a fleet of Celtic themed mecha warriors who worship the Emperor as the undying guardian of the elements, and it would work, for example. This isn't explicitly highlighted at any point, but the constant reminders are enough to give this book some much-needed life and variety.
The timeline itself is also fairly good. While it does admittedly suffer from very short and fleeting citations during much of the initial timeline, this improves considerably as it goes along. Besides a possible doomsday scenario - and expect an article on that quite soon - it helps to further establish how the two groups differ considerably from one another. A particular highlight is how a death-obsessed Knight world approaches a Tyranid Splinter Fleet invading their world, and their entire reaction to the event. Even without this, however, it also continually pushes to further expand on how knights are recruited or offer suggestions on just how the new ranks are implemented within their armies. There's a hierachy here, but there's enough of a general description offered to help give players ideas.
The bad, meanwhile, is a short but important part on here.
The Bad
The issue with the negative points within the army doesn't surround where they failed so much as what they didn't fix. For example, the big one notable from the very start is the incredible amount of padding in the second half of the book. Pages upon pages of enlarged photographs, or vast images of knights with minimal text are offered up, dominating huge chunks of the codex, while offering very little actual content. You could honestly narrow it down into perhaps a third of the space by downsizing a few repeated basic colour scheme images, and you wouldn't lose anything. What's especially frustrating about this is that the book even does this during the final half, where it compressed multiple examples of Freeblades together. Even then, this segment is only a small fraction of the size of the usual one, so it honestly comes across as if it was shunted in at the last second when it honestly just needed a general reworking of the parts prior to it.
Another definite problem with the book is that a few of its overall depictions of events, details and ideas tend to be quite nebulous. Yes, anything which can offer fans more fodder for their own creations is always welcome, but there needs to be something definitive. The few knight houses who end up getting a moment in the spotlight don't offer up anything more than a few basic and very generic concepts. There's nothing fully fleshed out about them, and it lacks something for fans to really use an identity as a defining starting point for their armies. Furthermore, because of this, most descriptions of Knight worlds tend to be very general. We are given enough to know that they vary considerably in nature, design and environment, but that's it. Unlike the descriptions of Macragge, Fenris or others, it's all something generalized and inserted into a single sentence.
Yet, perhaps the most irritating part still is how it doesn't do anything truly noteworthy with the new status quo. The best we get is the aforementioned doomsday possibility and a tantalizing mention that Mechanicus systems have been fortified within the great rift, creating small pocket Imperiums within the Warp storms. Yet, besides that, it's unfortunately just business as usual for this lot. There needed to be much more offered up to the army, something to help push the overall timeline or story forward within the book and show how events have been influenced. Without it, there's little to really help indicate that things have truly changed.
These sound like very short segments, but you need to keep in mind that these are obvious and quite evident problems. I can't break down or fully detail the problems with each, as there's little to no detail to actually work with. It's more of a case that so much of it is barely in the book rather than anything else.
The Artwork
The artwork here is good, but it heavily relies on reused pieces from the past. while we are offered a small number of new works here and there, almost all of it is stuff we saw in the first codex. This isn't to say that it's bad by any means, or even that it's unpleasant to look at, but it's difficult to say that there shouldn't have been more here.
The Verdict
This one is very mixed indeed. It's a perfect case of taking two steps forward and then one back, failing to fully build on what other novels had set up for it. There's certainly nothing truly criminal about it, nothing stupid and no true blind spots (as we even get a few character bits for Freeblades) but it just doesn't make the leap needed to work within this new altered universe. So, it's good on the whole, but unambitious, unfortunately.
So, that's the lore done. Next time, we'll be moving onto the rules.
June 15, 2018
Arguably the best fluff in a WH40K rulebook (until the next greenskins codex comes out). Because you can run so few models the rules and the writing both feel much more like an RPG than a wargame, which whips ass. Also the models are cool as hell.
March 20, 2023
Mechs are so cool.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews