Editing Iron Hands (section)

==Tabletop==
Good news is they got a much needed bone in 6th edition. Robin Cruddace realized how stupid it was for a chapter with close ties to the Ad-mech to not have a lot of gear; they're now loaded with tanks, aircraft, and dreadnoughts. Their variation of Chapter Tactics gives all marines 6+ FNP (which is a great bonus that will save a few marines here and there, but is not something to be built around), all of their characters and vehicles get It Will Not Die, and [[Techmarine|Techmarines/Masters of the Forge]] get +1 to Blessings of the Omnissiah. The strength in this particular set of Chapter Tactics is that basically every single model benefits from it, allowing you to play a wider selection of builds while still playing to its strengths.

...And then they get their own supplement, ''Clan Raukaan''. Interesting, it would seem GW is dealing with not knowing what to do with them by portraying the Chapter as full of contradictions, such as despite the clans being autonomous they do act like Codex companies. Apparently the Codex Astartes was simply "more logical" than the admittedly terrible idea of telling Guilliman and Dorn to go fuck themselves.

Also, [[Derp|the codex kinda skimped on the fluff]]. The Contqual campaign is pared down to mostly just the final battle on the Shardenus hub, and Supplement: Raukaan skips it entirely, instead introducing the Gaudinian Heresy (see above) instead of the campaign mentioned all over the fucking promotional material. It's also deeply suspicious that for a Chapter which must absolutely revere their Apothecaries, potentially folding them into their Techmarines like Space Wolves and Blood Angels do with their Chaplains, since they'd be the ones in charge of installing new cybernetics, their fluff consistently yammers on about their Techmarines and just doesn't discuss their Apothecaries at any great length.

Crunch-wise in 8th edition, it doesn't seem so crap. They've kept their 6+ FNP from 7th edition although as of the rulings on Disgusting Resilience they have to roll it for each point of damage, not wound now. That said, ignoring 16.6% of all incoming damage is helpful. Like all chapter tactics however the rule [[Fail|doesn't effect vehicles and the Iron Hands no longer gain a benefit to fixing tanks either.]] Changed as of 8.5 Marine Codex, with everything in the codex except Servitors gaining Chapter Tactics, as well as the chapter tactics themselves letting marines hit Overwatch on a 5 or 6, and Vehicles counting their wounds as double the remaining number for damage tables, as well as the 6+ Feel No Pain. [[Cheese|This also applies to Forgeworld models like Relic Leviathans, and the Astraeus Tank]]. Indeed, it seems that the Iron Hands' specialism of armored warfare has swung over busted for the sake of overcompensation.

Things got so bad, that the Iron Hands left some drastic limitations to Doctrine-equivalents for the rest of the SM and codices to follow: their Heavy weapons were able to reroll all 1s to hit and always act as if they were stationary on top of the additional AP (back when that mattered) so long as they were in the Devastator Doctrine; previously, Space Marine could elect to ''stay'' in this doctrine for the rest of the battle, which meant that the Iron Hands Primaris with heavy snipers and Firstborn heavies could just [[DAKKA|let it rip]]. Very fluffy, considering that is how they act in the lore, but because of how broken unkillable Leviathans were on top of SuperDevastator, they stipulated that you now had ''no choice'' but to move on. Necron protocols, Tyranid Imperatives, even the Traitor devastator doctrine equivalent pushed you off after turn 1, though Necrons eventually got to pick 1 Protocol to be active for the entire game because they were so bad without them (which was probably the original intention).

With their own codex supplement, Iron Hands are gaining a named character in the form of Iron Father [[Malkaan Feirros]], as well as bonuses for being a pure Iron Hands army, such as ignoring movement penalties for heavy weapons while the Devastator combat doctrine (+1ap for heavy Weapons) is active, six warlord traits, relics, special issue Wargear, and the Technomancy psychic discipline. [[Chapter Master Smashfucker]] rides again? Nah, he got overshadowed by the unkillable Leviathans. In 8th, Leviathans were T8 2+, 4++, and while they couldn't gain character protection, could be turned into a character to benefit from Warlord traits like a 5+++FNP. They could also have wounds intercepted by infantry, where your basic bitch Intercessors jumps in front of a Lascannon last minute to save the Leviathan from having to worry about making a 50% save, but that was thankfully nerfed.


As of 9th, the Iron Hands managed to stay consistently good, if not a bit overshadowed by the late-coded jank that meant some much [[Tau|more]] [[Tyranids|broken]] [[Harlequins|armies]] got to have their fun after Iron Hands. The Armor of Contempt patch-fix meant power armor stayed [[Plot armor|extra special]] compared to everyone else. There was a brief moment where people took [[Minotaurs]] as Iron Hands to make a goonsquad of character protected dreadnoughts. Eventually, though, what really reigned them in was the change to Command Points and costs. Burning 2 to 4 Cp on a dreadnought became a really steep cost, forcing Iron Hands players to [[Rage|try other things]].

Tl;dr if you like big tough robot boys who are disgustingly resilient backed up by even tougher vehicles, '''play Iron Hands'''