Editing Warhammer 40,000/8th Edition Tactics/Adeptus Custodes (section)

==Why play Talons of The Emperor ==

Maybe you like gold, perhaps you like playing as them for the 20 minutes between their initial release in 7e and the announcement of 8e, or perhaps you have the 30k version of the Custodes and don't want to pay for another army for use outside of Horus Heresy games. Maybe you want profiles for your basic infantry that make Terminators envious or maybe, just maybe, you just like the idea that all of your dudes are '''extremely fucking hard''' to kill. 

In any case, the Adeptus Custodes function as ''the'' high-profile, multi-wound elite army, with absurdly strong profiles backed up by equally steep point costs. When even an all-Paladin Grey Knights force consistently fields larger armies than you, every lost model will be sorely felt. However, their innate resilience compensates for their low numbers, and if you play your cards right, you can pull off some crazy stuff even when you're outnumbered. Just watch out for [[Imperial Guard|horde armies]] that can pour enough dakka into you to force unsaved wounds, [[Orks|or tarpit your super-troops]] [[Tyranids|through sheer numbers]]. The 40k Custodes now have a proper Codex, complete with options in every slot- and Forge World finally released 40k rules for all their Legio Custodes units, which means grav-tanks, [[Contemptor-Galatus Dreadnought|uber-Dreadnoughts]], specialist long-range infantry (praise the Emperor!), disintegration cannons welded to spears, and arguably [[Orion Gunship|the most beautiful airborne unit in the whole game]].

The full rules for the Custodes Forge World materiel can be found [https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/PDF/fw_warscrolls/40K_Adeptus_Custodes_FW_Datasheets_Ares.pdf here]. 

===Pros===

* You like anything close to this: golden armored [[Mary Sue|better than]] [[Deathwatch|the best of]] [[Space Marines|the best of the defenders of humanity]], with the genes of the [[emprah]] himself.

*You like running an army that, to whatever battlezone they deploy, the Administratum will immediately classify as a victory. Even before they get there. Even if they (somehow) lose. Oh yeah.

* You want to build, paint and transport an army consisting of about ~25 models total. This makes moving and understanding the game very easy.

* Your infantry are individually as tough as a hero compared to other armies: T5, 2+/4++, 3W is normal here!
**If you want to you can upgrade that 4++ to a 3++ relatively easily, and still hit like a tonne of bricks.

*You want to have access to the toughest, non-named character in the game (T6, W7, 2+/3++/5++ and rerolls on those saves)... We thought we'd seen His mightiest. We thought we'd witnessed the smashiest and fuckiest character in the game. Then, the War of the Spider raged and we were, oh, so wrong.

*Although not very diverse, they have BEAUTIFUL models with nice armor and weapons.

* You're the personal bodyguards of the Emperor himself!

* Your guys are BIG! Even Marines look like Squats next to you!

* You want to play as Super Space Marines, but don't like the idea of playing [[Grey Knights|teamkilling]] [[Khornate Knights|psychopaths]]!

* You want a shooty army without having them being vulnerable in assault or an assault army that is just as good at shooting. Custodes melee weapons usually come with the profile of a Relic Bolter. If they don't carry a gun, they will have access to some sort of firepower.

* Currently the only Imperium list with [[Jetbike|Jetbikes]]. Not [[Sammael|A Jetbike]], [[awesome|JETBIKES]]. Now Forgeworld has stopped moving slow as fuck we have access to two types of Jetbike!

* They have the biggest [[pauldrons]] you’ve ever seen!!!

* Technically quite good for beginners due to very low model count and a playstyle which isn't exactly hard to master.

* Can be extremely easy to paint - gold undercoat, red capes, and plumes, silver weaponry. And it's not hard to make them look good either - Duncan has great tutorials on Custodes. 

* It's not that expensive to build a Custodes army when compared to quite a few other factions (still expensive but every GW army is). 2000pts worth of Custodes will likely cost you less than a 2000pt Guard, Tau or Tyranid army as examples, and you will certainly save money on paint and glue and your dudes will take less than a quarter of the time to build and paint that a nid/guard/ork horde army would. 

* The Legio Custodes units are finally unleashed upon the Dark Imperium. Of course, this comes [[Contemptor-Galatus Dreadnought|with]] [[Coronus Grav Carrier|all]] [[Telemon Heavy Dreadnought|the]] [[Caladius Grav-Tank|goodies]] [[Aquilon Terminator|that]] [[Orion Gunship|entails]].

===Cons===
*[[HERESY|You might get tired of gold after a while]] (in which case, start painting Shadowkeepers or Solar Watch instead).

*You WILL get tired of the Austin Powers jokes.

* You will get even more tired of the "Little Kitten" jokes.

*In 8th edition a.k.a The Volume of Fire Edition your high priced (both points and dollars) Bananamen are at risk of falling to high volumes of low strength fire. There are plenty of ways to protect yourself, but [[Grimdark|even The Emperor’s Companions are not immortal in these dark times.]]

*While the Custodes Forgeworld units are among the best in the game now they have rules, we can't be entirely sure that drug dealing alone will be enough to pay for things like the Orion and the Telemon. But hey, [[Adeptus Mechanicus|you only need one lung and one kidney to live.]] [[Dark_Eldar|Nobody said they have to be yours.]]

*Even a single lost model will hurt like hell, and even with your buffed version of Objective Secured you can expect to struggle in holding objectives.

*Only three named characters and no real diversity to them (either 1 of 2 big guys that kick ass in melee or a terrifying women that makes you wet yourself to look upon her) such as dreadnought or mounted units. There’s also no forge world HQ’s to make use of all the forge world goodies.
*Without an allied detachment or Forgeworld units, your anti-armor and long-range games are severely lacking. Not a huge problem for Custodes but using Allarus Terminators, Vertus Jetbikes and Contemptor Dreadnoughts to deal with TEQ heavy or mechanized armies can be quite expensive.

*No psykers means no Deny the Witch. Sure, you have Aegis of the Emperor and some relics/strats that can help with this, but you will want a dedicated Psyker defense. Bringing in an allied detachment with a psyker or a few Sisters of Silence, or([[Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Imperium(8E)#Adeptus_Astra_Telepathica|both]]) is a good idea.

* You might be considered [[That Guy]].

*Your Battle Plans are, for the most part, very basic and therefore easily predictable. The vast majority includes getting your Custodians up the pitch and into combat recklessly fast with no regard for actually holding Objectives. Of course, the only ultimate objective the Custodians care for in the fluff is saving old Emps, so what do you expect? Elaborate plans are for [[Tzeentch|pussies]].

* A pure Custodes list without allies isn't very competitive in 8th, you can bring allies to reliably win.
**As you scroll through the unit analysis section, you might notice one major thing: this is the only army in the game where forge world units make up more than half of all available units (14 FW to 11 GW). As a result, practically the only way to make a pure Custodes list faintly competitive is to use Forge World, which is a problem if you’re poor like most of the editors of 1d4chan are. Hey! The sucker punch here, however, is that there are not yet forge world HQ variants of the forge world units. So no jet pack captain to deep strike with your jet packs. No uber jet bike captain to escort your uber jet bikes. And no terminator captain with the uber power Fist to lead your murderball of S: 10 destruction.
**Another negative is that some local store tournament organizers or puritan players may not allow Forge World units to be used in "official" games. This is highly subjective to your local competitive scene. Do note that official GW tournaments and any tournaments following the ITC rule set decree that all currently supported Forge World units are fully legal for use.

*You will suffer against anything with decent invulnerability saves or stuff like quantum shielding that allows a model to ignore high damage weapons. Regardless of how good you are in combat, things like Wulfen and bike squads with TH/SS will gladly stay and fight you, or worse chase you down. Fail one save and you're gone, while it might take two attacks from us to kill a multiple wound model. Custodes rely on high damage per hit to kill their targets as opposed to eg. The imperial guard who rely on rate of fire, and in the 8th edition a high rate of fire is king. The good news is that your basic guns are only 2 damage, so while they can still knock a decent chunk of wounds off a target, they'll still be quite hard to stop with stuff like Quantum Shielding. This only gets better in CC as you now have an eye-watering high number of attacks to add to high S and AP characteristics, essentially making you become the Imperial Guard Shooting Phase when in combat. D3 damage again also helps you dodge QS.