General Rules

In Warhammer 40,000 there are many different types of troops, from normal humans to gene enhanced Space Marines, and from haughty but human-like Eldar to the eldritch horror of the Tyranids. To represent this, nearly every model in the game has a set of numerical characteristics.

Characteristic Profiles

Every troop type has a profile detailing its given characteristic, for example:

Heroic characters are an army's leaders and heroes. Unless stated to the contrary, a character moves and fights as an individual, picking targets freely—the standard rules for Choosing A Target do not bind them unless they are firing a Heavy Weapon.

Leading Squads

A character may join any squad by moving to within 2"—Standard Squad Coherency—of it and declaring that they are leading it. The squad may then use the character's Leadership for any Leadership Test it takes—Psychology, Rally and Break tests alike.

A character who has joined a squad may leave it whenever they wish—except while the squad is affected by Psychology, has declared a Charge, or is engaged in Hand-to-Hand Combat. A character may not join and leave the same squad in one turn, but may leave one squad and join another.

Where a squad declares a Charge, any character who has already joined it must charge with it and fight in the combat that follows. A character may always charge alone instead, leaving the squad behind.

A character leading a squad counts as part of it in all respects. Should the squad be Broken, the character is Broken with it, fleeing in the open or going to ground in cover as the squad does. A character Immune to Psychology is the exception, and Broken Troops gives the rule.

Psychology is tested for separately. Where a character is subject to a rule the squad is not, they test alone and react alone; this may draw them away from the squad.

Champion-level characters (excluding Psyker Champions) are always members of a squad and cannot leave it.

Targeting Characters

A character standing more than 2" from every other unit may be fired at only when it is the closest target. If a character is within 2"—Standard Squad Coherency—of models at least as large as it and it is not the leader, then it cannot be selected as a target for shooting, even by other characters. If the unit within Standard Squad Coherency of the character is hit, the hit(s) are randomised across squad members and character together.

A hit allocated to the character is rolled to wound, and saved, against the character's own profile.

The Heroic Character with the highest Leadership is designated as the army's Commander. If more than one Heroic Character has the same Leadership, the player nominates one to be the Commander.

Any unit within 12" of the Commander may use the Commander's Leadership value instead of its own when making any Leadership Tests.

If the Commander is slain, any units within 12" must take an immediate Break Test, even if they have already taken one in that turn.

The Battle Standard

A Commander may be accompanied by a character bearing the army's battle standard, a rallying point for the whole force and the focus of its pride and determination. The standard need not stay with the Commander, though it serves best nearby. A Heroic Character normally carries it, and every rule for character models applies to the bearer.

Any unit within 12" of the battle standard may retake one failed Break Test a turn. Where the Commander stands within 12" as well, the unit has both that retake and the Commander's Leadership, and will tend to hold its ground whatever comes against it.

The rulebook offers a second choice—a character carrying the Commander's personal banner in place of the army's standard—but gives it no rules of its own, and no published army list offers one. Personal banners survive in the codexes as heraldry alone. Every standard bearer in print, from the Space Marine Company Standard to the Ork Battle Standard, carries the army's battle standard and uses the rules above.

Psykers are chosen as part of an army using the appropriate Codex army list.

Mastery Level

To represent their varying levels of power, Psykers are rated according to their Mastery Level, ranging from 1 to 4—the higher the level, the more potent the Psyker. At the start of the game, each Psyker is dealt one Psychic Power per Mastery Level.

Psychic Disciplines

There are 10 Psychic Disciplines, each represented by a deck of Psychic Power Cards. Some Psykers can only draw from a single discipline, while others have access to several. Each Psyker has a primary discipline—from which they must always draw at least one power—and may have one or more tertiary disciplines from which they can draw additional powers.

Dealing Psychic Powers

Psychic Power Cards are dealt in two stages—first all Primary Discipline powers, then all Tertiary Discipline powers. Within each stage, cards are dealt one Psyker at a time, beginning at the highest Mastery Level and working down. Where two or more Psykers stand at the same Mastery Level, a D6 decides who is dealt to first. Each Psyker resolves any Discards before moving on to the next.

At least one power must always come from the Primary Discipline before any Tertiary Discipline powers are drawn. If a player wishes to draw from a Tertiary Discipline, they must wait until all Primary Discipline draws have concluded.

Discarding & Redrawing

Once a Psyker has been dealt their cards, the player may choose to discard some or all in favour of randomly dealt replacements.

Only one round of redrawing is permitted per Psyker, per discipline. Any discarded cards are returned to the deck, shuffled in, and the replacement is drawn at random from the same discipline. The new cards must be kept.

By mutual agreement, players may redraw before returning discards to the deck.

Keeping Powers Secret

Once Psychic Power Cards have been dealt, players should keep them hidden until they wish to use them. Place the cards face down, keeping each Psyker's powers separate from one another. This is important because Psykers may not use each other's powers, even if they share the same disciplines.

In Warhammer 40,000, cavalry means any unit whose mount has a single wound. A mount with more than one carries special rules of its own instead. Rider and mount count as one model, and the mount leaves play with the rider when the rider dies.

A cavalry model takes its Leadership, Toughness and Wounds from the rider, and its Move from the mount; the mount's own Toughness, Wounds and Leadership are never used. Being mounted improves the armour saving throw by +1, and in Hand-to-Hand Combat the mount's Attacks characteristic joins the rider's own.

Models of one unit stay close together at all times. After a squad moves, a line must be traceable through every model in it, base edge to base edge, with no step longer than 2". Each model is within 2" of the next, not of every other.

Broken Coherency

Over the course of a game a number of scenarios may cause a unit to break Squad Coherency.

During Hand-to-Hand Combat models are not bound by Squad Coherency, but they must return to it once combat has finished.

Casualties are the usual cause, but Squad Coherency may be broken by anything. However it happens, the unit must re-establish coherency in its next Movement Phase. There is no penalty where it can, and where it cannot the smaller part of the split unit counts as being Broken.

That broken part rallies of its own accord the moment coherency is restored, with no Leadership Test asked for.

Dispersed Formation

Certain units fight in Dispersed Formation, which stretches their coherency range to 4".

If a model or unit has the Infiltration ability, it can be placed on the table after both armies have been deployed, instead of during the standard deployment sequence. Infiltrating units may be placed anywhere in the Battle Zone that is not in Line of Sight of any enemy model. If they are placed behind or within concealing terrain, they may start the game in Hiding. If both sides intend to deploy infiltrating units, they must each roll a D6—with the lowest score deploying first.

Hidden Models

A Hidden model cannot be seen and cannot be targeted during the Shooting Phase. If any model in a Hidden unit Moves or Shoots, the whole unit is no longer Hidden. Models can go into Overwatch while remaining Hidden, but they cease to be Hidden once they open fire.

Normally a Hidden model is revealed as soon as it moves; however, if a model begins its turn Hidden and moves only through concealing terrain, it will remain Hidden.

Hiding and going into Overwatch take a turn each: a model hides in one turn and goes into Overwatch in the next.

Going into Hiding

A model goes into hiding at the end of its Movement Phase if it either stood still or covered no more than its normal move—never after a Charge or a Run. Only a model standing in cover, or behind an obstacle that would conceal it, may hide at all. Cavalry cannot hide, nor can vehicles or models in Tactical Dreadnought Armour.

A squad hides whole or not at all. No part of one may hide while the rest of it stands in the open.

Spotting Hidden Models

Models can spot Hidden troops within a radius equal to their Initiative (in inches). A Hidden model is spotted as well where enemy models reach a position from which they can see around or over whatever conceals it.

A model that spots a Hidden enemy for itself makes it Detected, and that model alone may then fire at it normally.

Detecting Hidden Models

When even a single model in a Hidden unit is Detected, the entire squad ceases to be Hidden and becomes Detected. Some models also have equipment or traits that allow them to make Hidden enemies Detected from afar.

A Detected model is still out of sight to every model that has not spotted it, and those models may not target it directly during the Shooting Phase. Only a Blast or Template weapon may be fired at it. A model caught in such a weapon's area of effect is hit on a D6 roll of 4+, whether it is Detected or still Hidden.

A teleporter is a device built into a spaceship or a building, and it sets a squad on the battlefield directly. Squads allowed to teleport into a battle are named in their own army list.

A squad teleports in the Movement Phase. Place one model of the squad where the squad means to arrive, then roll the Scatter Dice and 2D10 to find where it lands.

A double 1 on the two D10 destroys the whole squad in a teleporter accident. Otherwise the model moves the distance rolled, in the direction the Scatter Dice gives. A hit deviates by the small arrow on that face, so an arriving squad always moves.

A model carried off the table edge has failed to arrive, and the squad may try again in its next turn. A model that comes down in a building, a vehicle or any other solid object deviates again from where it stands.

Once the first model is placed the rest of the squad goes anywhere within 2" of it. Teleported models may shoot and fight in Hand-to-Hand Combat in the turn they arrive, though arriving straight into a combat does not count as Charging.

A squad that has paid the points to teleport in may teleport out again. It is removed from the table in its own Movement Phase and does not return later in the game.

Teleport Homer

A teleport homer puts out a coded signal for a teleporter to lock onto. Where a squad teleports to a spot lying within 6" of a working homer—one carried by another squad, for example—a hit on the Scatter Dice locks the arrival on and it does not move at all. An arrow deviates it as usual.

Players are awarded Victory Points for fulfilling certain criteria during a game. Each Mission Card lists the points awarded for completing its objectives. Additionally, Victory Points are awarded for damage done to the opponent's units, as follows:

Squads

A squad that is Broken when the game ends counts as wiped out. A Shaken squad does not.

Vehicles

A vehicle counts as Disabled where it can no longer move and either every weapon it carries has been destroyed or its whole crew is dead.

Characters

Vehicle Squadrons

The rules for forming and fielding squadrons are described in Vehicle Squadrons.

Support Weapon Batteries

The rules for forming and fielding batteries are described in Support Weapon Batteries.

When using these tables to work out Victory Points, the points value is the total cost of the unit—including any Wargear.

These are the expanded tables from Dark Millennium; the supplement supersedes the base rulebook. The rulebook's own table is simpler, and players who prefer it score as follows.

Mission Cards describe one or more objectives to be accomplished during a game—and the Victory Points awarded for doing so.

Faction Restrictions

Orks never take The Assassins or Witch Hunt—such tactics never occur to them.

The Tyranid player does not draw from the deck, but randomly selects a mission from a list of six—by rolling a D6 or using the randomiser.

Only Engage and Destroy, The Assassins, Witch Hunt, Hold the Line, and Take and Hold may be taken against Tyranids—the remaining missions assume bases to raid, ammunition to steal, or bunkers to assault.

The full list is available here.

For every 1,000 points an army consists of—or part thereof—1 Strategy Card may be drawn at random. An army of 1,500 points therefore draws 2 cards.

Some special characters and items of wargear alter how many Strategy Cards a force draws, or negate particular cards. Any such exception is given in the relevant army list entry.

The Tyranids faction never draws Strategy Cards. Instead, they have special rules that are implemented directly before Strategy Cards are drawn.

Players fighting against Tyranids remove Virus Outbreak, Malfunction, and Traitor from the deck before drawing. Facing Tyranids, Crack Shot halves the target's Toughness, rounding up.

The full list is available here.

Wargear Cards represent the rare and specialised equipment carried by an army's leaders—bionics, relics, force fields and master-crafted weapons. Only Heroic Characters may be given them; ordinary troopers never carry one.

A character carries no more cards than their rank allows. The chart below gives that allowance, and applies equally to Ork bosses, Eldar Exarchs and their like. It stands unless the character's own army list entry supersedes it.

Each card's points value is printed on the card itself, and is added to the points value of the character carrying it. Chosen cards are written on the army roster.

Every card belongs to one of three rarity classes. The class is a rule rather than a label—it governs how many of that card an army may field.

Two of these limits are given as recommendations rather than rules. White Dwarf 195 recommends that Unique items are used only by the special characters listed as carrying them in an army list, and that another character may take one only if the opponent agrees before the battle starts. The Uncommon allowance is a recommendation on the same footing.

Restrictions

Rarity governs quantity alone. The restrictions printed on a card—a race, a troop type, or a named bearer—apply in addition, and are never set aside by it.

Some items are expended in use. Where a card says so, it is discarded once its effect has been resolved and may not be taken again for the rest of the battle.

Wargear in Play

A card stays with the character it was allocated to. If that character is killed their wargear is destroyed with them, and may not be salvaged by anyone else. Characters may not pass wargear from one to another during a battle.

A scenario whose objective is the capture of a device or piece of equipment may set this aside, but that is an exception rather than the ordinary case.

Two departures from the sources are worth noting. Codex Ultramarines states that a Wargear card cannot be allocated more than once, which applies the Unique restriction to every card; White Dwarf 195 is later and more precise, and the site follows it. The rulebook gives the allowance as a chart by rank while the codex gives it as the character's army list entry; neither says which governs, and the site treats the chart as the standing allowance and an army list entry as superseding it.