Journal Tactica – The Forces of Saturn is a brand new supplement for the latest edition of the Horus Heresy Age of Darkness which provides some fantastic new lore regarding the origin of the infamous Saturnine pattern armour and its adoption and utilisation by the various Legions as well as some new gaming content in the form of new missions, Detachments and units.

Thank you to Games Workshop for providing Sprues and Brews with a review copy of the new Journal Tactica – The Forces of Saturn. If you want to support the site why not order all your new Horus Heresy related hobby supplies through our affiliate Element Games and save yourself some money too!

We also have full unboxings of the Fellblade and MKII assault squads up today!

The Phoebian Accord

A substantial portion of the new Journal Tactica, approximately 30 pages, is given over to new lore, providing some exciting details regarding the origins of the Saturnine project and how Vulkan’s gift was distributed, received and put to use by the different Legions on both sides of the Heresy.

We’re also treated to a new perspective of the Istvaan Dropsite Massacre, primarily focused around Vulkan and his Legion’s exploits during that fated operation but there are also some cool sections describing the Thousand Sons’ involvement in the Saturnine project and some White Scars and Word Bearers content too.

Mission Rules

There are rules for four new missions included in the Journal, including one Legendary mission – the Ignis Sector Assault – which sees a force of Salamanders led by Vulkan attack the flank of Mortarion’s Death Guard (however you could easily swap in alternative forces should you wish).

The mission features a unique Deployment map which sees the attacking Salamanders deploying their various ‘Saturnine’ units in an aggressive position on the battlefield whereas the Death Guard are able to hold units in Reserves to deploy directly into their opponent’s Deployment zone from turns three and four onwards. The Death Guard possess the ability to perform a preliminary bombardment of the battlefield and can take advantage of numerous defensive features such as barricades and trenches.

The three Onslaught Missions presented in the new Journal offer a nice mix of asymmetrical ‘Attacker vs Defender’ style missions that can be played as one off games or in the form of a linked campaign. In these missions the Defender is unable to score Victory Points from claiming objectives but instead all their units gain a form of the Vanguard (x) special rule!

Line Advance is a very interesting mission which sees the Attackers forced to advance in order to claim objectives that creep upwards towards the opponent’s Deployment zone over the course of the battle. As the objectives move back towards the Defenders board edge they increase in value meaning as an attacker you’ll want to make sure you enter the latter part of the battle with enough force to contest the objectives.

Breakthrough has similar ‘Advancing Objectives’ rules but also allows the Defender to hold back units in Reserves and bring them on from either of the short battlefield edges.

Dawn Raid features a diagonal style Deployment Map and forces the Defender to deploy all their forces before the Attacker who then gets a chance to sieze the initiative on a dice roll of 4+ and snatch the first turn. The mission again features ‘Advancing Objectives’ and also imposes a ‘Snap Shots only’ restriction on the first turn.

Dawn Raid feels to me to be the less interesting of the new missions but Line Advance in particular really excites me and I’m looking forward to trying it our against Dave and Matt in the near future!

Legiones Astartes Detachments

We get two new Detachments for Legiones Astartes armies, an Apex and Auxiliary. The Linebreaker Echelon is an Apex Detachment which grants two Heavy Assault slots (one Prime), a Retinue and War Engine slot. You must choose either Saturnine, Cataphractii or Tataros type units to fill the Heavy Assault and Retinue slots and cannot mix and match such types in the same Detachment. The Maelstrom Sentry Battery Detachment is unlocked by a Master of Signals and provides three Recon slots which must be filled by Tarantula Battery units and two Support slots that can be filled by Araknae Quad Accelerator Platform units.

Both these Detachments are great additions to those presented in the Core rulebook and Libers, especially the Linebreaker Echelon which provides both a Prime slot and the otherwise difficult to include War Engine and Retinue slot.

Additional Unit Profiles

The Journal gives the player an opportunity to field the new Saturnine models in the form of a Centurian and Command Squad. Word Bearers and Thousand Sons players get something a little extra in the form of a new unit, the Phraetus Annointed Conclave, and a new Prosperine Arcana.

The Centurion in Saturnine Terminator Armour possesses the useful Officer of the Line (2) special rule as well as all the standard Saturnine utility such as the Teleport Synchoniser and Occulix Targeting Auspex.

The Saturnine Terminator Command Squad contains between one and five Saturnine Chosen lead by a Saturnine Chosen Champion. The unit possesses a Saturnine Teleport Synchroniser with the option to swap their ranged weapons for the Paired Saturnine Disruption Fists option, allowing each model to make four attacks with the Disruption Fists profile. The unit can also take a Legion standard in line with other Command Squad options.

The Phraetus Anointed Conclave are a Word Bearers Elite unit armoured in Saturnine Terminator Armour and armed with Paired Disruption Fists. This is a super tough unit, possessing the Eternal Warrior (1) special rule. The unit does have the Explodes (5+) special rule and Warpfire Mantle which causes the unit to potentially inflict D3 automatic AP 2 D1 wounds on nearby units (friend or foe) when they make successful Armour or Invulnerable Saves as a result of a Shooting attack.

The Osiraean Prosperine Arcana can be selected for any of the Saturnine and Walker units in a Thousand Sons army for a small points cost. This grants two additional Psychic Powers in Psychometry and Machine Empathy. The former reduces the impact of any Overload effects when making an Overwatch Reaction whereas the latter allows the unit to recover lost wounds. Both useful options on ‘tanky’ units like Saturnine Terminators and Dreadnoughts.

Summary

From a pure content perspective I think Journal Tactica – The Forces of Saturn is a great supplement for the new edition of Horus Heresy. In particular I found the new Onslaught missions a great addition to the game providing some additional variety and play experience to the game. It’s also nice to see additional units and Detachments added to the game however I’m not sure the £16 asking price represents particularly good value – we used to get similar content in the old Exemplary Battles PDFs for free after all. That said however, for completionists and those who want to add this lore and missions to their collections its well worth picking up!

Thank you again to Games Workshop for providing Sprues and Brews with a review copy of the new Journal Tactica – The Forces of Saturn which is available to pre-order today, Saturday 20th of September.

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