In 6th edition 40k rule book an army can include allies, or not, according to this table.

First the obligitory. Damn you Matt Ward!

Much of it obvious based on what you'd expect but there's few surprises. Doesn't make a lot of difference to playing this game but opens up some story lines or some background. I could have easily put it other rpg forums but there seemed to be more talk of 6th ed here in general.

I thought about this table, you beat me to posting it.

DW marines would be much different for their allies table than their original chapter I would think. Perhaps they would fall under the general marine alliances with some changes for certain xenos races.  For a table top game I can see where they're going with this, but does that make this list the "new" canon?  I don't see orks or dark eldar or necrons allying with anyone. No matter what the convenience is.  They may be on the battlefield together, and may even ignore each other for a moment while a more likely target is near, but will surely attack when the opportunity presents itself.

I don't see this working without some modifications for WH40KRP.

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Plus that table doesn't make the slightest bit of fluff-sense. Black Templars have a problem with Sisters, but are A-OK with Eldar? Dark Eldar bro-fisting Daemons? I don't think so.

BYE

 I especially like the Imperial Guard as Allies of Convenience with Chaos Marines and Daemons. 

Also, that the Tau are Allies of Convenience with all the named space marine chapters, but are best buds with the generic chapters.

What a hole they have dug for themselves with that chart. 

 IG/Chaos is great for making a Lost and the Damned army, or representing a bunch of cultists supporting a CSM force.

It's possible that the fluff is going to be seriously overhauled and the WH40K universe will no longer be the same as that of the last three editions. Considering how much it has changed since Rogue Trader (my preferred source of fluff), I can say that I view this as a potential opportunity to improve the product.

Silly, silly table. Best ignored. Some of it is fine (Imperial Guard being able to ally with pretty much everyone works for "count as" traitor armies etc, though some of the priorities seem wrong), but some of it is… well a bit stupid (Black Templars are more willing to ally with the Tau and Eldar than the Sisters of Battle… erm, what?), and it makes no balance sense (opens all sort of abusive combos, and tyranids can't ally with anyone).

Either they should have left allies for friendly games (have no active rules for them, just suggest it), make sure they were balanced (which would be hard), or made them consistent (which they aren't. Imperials should be more willing to ally with themselves than their enemies).

To be honest, I think the significance of this table is vastly overstated. It's principally a game mechanic, intended to embody (to a degree) the background, rather than forumulate it.

It's a big universe, and all kinds of strange alliances can happen at any point in its history. Look at real life - how would the UK and USA work on this chart? How about in 1812? How about the USA and the Taleban? Not before Armegeddon, right? Oh, but hang on, they were (effectively) allies back in the '80s, during the Russian/Afghan war. 

If you don't like aspects of the table (the Sororitas/Black Templar one sounds odd to me, too) then just talk it out with your opponent and adjust accordingly. After all, I think one can work out background-appropriate alliances for just about any combination of armies without reference to the exact formulation of this chart.

(Tyranids + Guard = Genestealer cult army. Just saying.)

HappyDaze said:

I don't see any signs of a massive background overhaul along the lines you suggest. My reading of 6th ed is that it's actually a fairly conservative update of the background. It doesn't, for example, advance the "Golden Throne is failing" aspect introduced by 5th ed very much…though it respectfully mentions it. In fact "respectful" is the word I would use to summarise the entire book. It builds very gently upon all that has gone before, with nods to very old background (Squats) and fantastic art and production.

I think there's a lot of hyperbole about things like this chart. People hear about Matt Ward's involvement and start frothing at the mouth. Although I didn't like a lot of the Grey Knights stuff, I thought the Necron Codex was good, and I like the 6th ed background. I think he's become the internet fanbase's whipping boy, which is a pity, and undeserved. 

 What it does for me is illustrate how little I know about some of these armies. I always though Black Templars were the Space Marine equivalent of Sisters of Battle (not in the back ground of course) but apparently they don't get on. And I'd expected Eldar and Dark Eldar to hate each other as per Trope, and that Dark Elder where on the Chaos side. Gives the Eldar quite a few army lists to draw from.

On a similar vein, the Tau get off pretty well, I guess that's politics for you and not understanding Chaos 'Deamons, oh superstitious monkey, clearly that race has a bad skin condition.'. Also best buds with the Eldar (apparently), I always thought they had it in them to form an alliance (mostly where they would get added if you had to lump them in sides for a soon to be cancelled video game.

Others were more or less as expected, Guard, between the IG themselves, Lost and the Damned, Gue-Vesa, Mercenaries (or inquisitorial plants), can pretty much go anyone. Thought they would have been more in with Inquisition but clearly they have to watch over their shoulder the whole time.

Question remains What would Deathwatches look like? Obviously initially you might think all xeno's would be NBTA, but might their be situations where it might be best to side with one against a more abominable enemy?

I liked the way previous Editions were trending toward re-implementing Allies rules, with logical 'mixed' armies made possible by Codex: Daemonhunters, Codex: Witch Hunters, and the 'Lost and Damned' army list from Codex: Eye of Terror. Seeing this list, however, with its nonsensical combos, is a pretty disappoining pay-off to a good trend…

That said, it does set up something I've been wanting to see for a while now: a Codex devoted entirely to Mercenaries! I'd love to see a bunch of new xenos (that could cross over into DW, naturally) filling 'hired gun' roles, a la the Loxotl (sp?) from the Gaunt's Ghosts novels, plus odds and ends that wouldn't warrent their own Codex, like Hrud, Space Pirates, etc.

 It's also worth baring in mind that this is permissive list table rather than a forced freindship thing. The Imperial Guard lists contains a nigh infinate number number of regiments and the Space Marine one up to 995 chapters.

Just because it say's a standard IG army will quite happily fight alongside Chaos armies it doesn't mean you'd ever consider including a squad of daemons in your Cadian or Kreig force.

And where as there may have been a point in time where a Space Marine force formed a loose alliance with an Ork warlord to fight a greater foe doesn't force a Crimson Fist player to do anything other than kill on site.

Face Eater said:

So we are clear, I don't play TT, but I know the fluff.

From a TT stand point, if you can, by rule, run daemons alongside your Krieg or Cadians, and they would be useful, why wouldn't you?

As an outsider looking in, it just looks like a colossal mess of silliness.

ItsUncertainWho said:

Well a douchbag might, and I can't guarantee that some of the TT players aren't :s

But most people put a lot of effort into their forming their armies.

And the Krieg armylist is actually a bad example as they have their own army list, but they said it was the same as normal guard armies for allies. Of course there's nothing stopping you using the Krieg army list for your Chaos following seige regiment.

 The only thing I don't like about it is how the 'nids cannot ally with anyone else; while the cronnies are now kosher.

Also, Only "Battle Brothers" means a good relationship. Allies of convenience is a mutually distrustful partnership, and allies of desperation is a temporary ceasefire at best to deal with a bigger problem.

Fenrisnorth said:

Yeah, It's not good to be Nids. I mean obviously they are aren't the most political but they've historically had mind slave and brood brothers for a start. Maybe they didn't want mind slave with vehicles and planes and are planning a GS cult army or mind slave entry.

And Nec's have it surprisingly easy, most are are desperate allies though, and i've seen a really nice necron controlled tau army with necron circuits and scarabs all over them, so at least there's that.