Special Characters

So I decided to take a break from doing lists and bitching about magic to do an actual blog for once! As you probably guessed form the title, this post is going to be on special characters and the ethics of taking them. In my mind, special characters fall into two categories as to why they are taken. The first is the uber-competitive GT cruisers who take a Teclis/White Lion Death Start with the Banner of the World Dragon. The second category are the characters there to work with and buff out a fluffy themed army. For example, I have a 3000 point all Skink (save for some Kroxigor and monsters obviously) that includes both Tehenhauin and Tetto'Eko. I know that the former of the two is not all that scary, but the latter is certainly a competitive choice that a lot of exceptional Lizardmen players will swear by. I take these guys because the rest of my army is sitting at mostly T2 and Ld5 with almost no armor save. It's the closest thing to Skaven that I will ever consider fielding. So the extreme power of Tetto is balanced out by the relative weakness of the rest of my army. In my mind that is how special characters are designed to be run. They're supposed to be overpriced and underpowered but with some interesting abilities that make the army run in a different way then it would if you didn't have the special character. The problem now is that with End Times, the temptation to take that really powerful character with the absolutely beautiful model is becoming more and more irresistible. However, now it can be fielded in a competitive army which really brings into question the ethical issues regarding some of these characters. Even in the community, you have a big split over the issue of special characters. Some people, most notably Anthony from the Sustainable Center, absolutely despise the use of special characters and even refuse to go over them in his book reviews. Others side with the former legend of the game, Malorian, who have taken special characters on occasion to see if they are actually viable in a competitive army and very much enjoy the fluff and insanity that comes with taking these named characters. I fall right in the middle, and I've met people who are just like me in that regard. My philosophy for taking special characters is very simple. If you have an army that is fluffy or follows a theme at the cost of taking more competitive choices, then I believe you are entitled to take a/multiple special characters. If you really have a hard on for one of the main clans in the Skaven fluff, I think taking one of their special characters is completely within reason. If you really like Clan Pestilins, then take Skrolk and his busted ass ability to move Plague Monks from Special to Core. Take all the Plague Claw Catapults and Plague Furnaces that you want. However, the moment you substitute the theme for competitive choices (Hell Pit Abominations, Warp Lightning Cannons, etc.) is the moment you lose the right to take a special character. Another one that I'm very familiar with is my buddy Dave and his Maneater themed unit. Yes, the Maneaters with Golgfang is a very powerful combination, but when the rest of your army is comprised of Gnoblars and other hilarious things, then it takes away from the win-at-all-costs mentality that I see a lot of people, more so in 40K then in Fantasy, still have. The other big draw is that 9 out of 10 times, the model for the special characters is absolutely gorgeous in comparison to the standard model. I cannot tell you how many Empire players I've seen use the Marius Leitdorf model as their Empire General mounted on a horse. Or how many Dwarf players use the Grimm Burloksson model for their Master Engineer. The models look absolutely fucking amazing, and I can't fault them for wanting to display those gorgeous babies. There are also some characters that fall into a naturally fluffy area that you will almost always see in their signature unit in both fluff and competitive lists. The best and most renown example of which are Kouran Darkhand and Tullaris Dreadbringer, the Dark Elf special characters representing the Black Guard and the Executioners respectively. I absolutely love these kinds of characters, because their existence almost encourages people to take more fluffly themed lists then anything else. Sure, Kouran makes an already tough unit even more powerful by making them Unbreakable, but he's now coming out of a section that you could use to run a really nasty generic character. These unit inspired characters have been coming up more and more in 8th edition books, and I really like that a lot. In fact, it's hard to find a book that has special characters not attached to a particular unit. Bretonnians fit that because they have only three special characters and are two editions overdue for a book. Another build that I really enjoy is an all Black Ark Corsair list with Lokhir Fellheart, Sorceresses, Black Ark Corsairs, Assassin(s), Dark Riders, and Reaper Bolt Throwers. Something I threw together for my fiance to bring to one of our local tournaments. Does that sounds like a list that would clobber at a GT to you? I didn't think so. Guess what, she kicked my ass up and down the field (though to be fair I was rolling with a very fluffy Bretonnian army filled with mostly Questing Knights and a Grail Reliquae). However, I do not condone taking a special character just to win. I know that in a GT you're going there not to lose, but have the fun of taking a special character is making a theme that the entire army is going on. Teclis in a horde of White Lions is not fluffy, that's a rape train. You know the difference. Again, I have no problem with special characters. I do have a problem when you're taking a special character just to rick-roll your opponents with no thought towards the enjoyment of the battle. Which is why we play Fantasy in the first place and not 40K. So please, remember that there's a difference between a themed army and being a dick. Don't be a dick, no one likes to play a dick.