In my “Limited” understanding of the rules…

For many editions of their various core rulebooks, Games Workshop has released a “Collectors” or “Limited” edition. While they’ve released some for Warhammer Fantasy and Age of Sigmar, my interest has always been Warhammer 40,000 so these are the various ones I’ve collected over the years. Feel bad for my wallet.

GW started releasing 40K limited edition rulebooks starting with 4th edition. Each one is individually numbered for those who care about such things. This article goes through all of the versions I have, up through 8th. I do not own 9th yet and as of this writing, the 10th edition limited was released…and predictably sold out in nanoseconds. I’ll pick one up when they hit the secondary market, but I have included images of them for posterity!

Fourth Edition

The first of the 40K fancy-schmancy rulebooks, it is a comparatively simple affair compared to what would come later. Contained within a nice slipcover, the book had an “official declaration” pasted to the interior cover. Note this was back when only men were expected to possibly want such a tome…

Fifth Edition

GW kicked it up a notch (as they used to say on the Food Network) with this edition. The rulebook had a fancy trifold cover with beautiful black and white artwork, as well as the first officially produced Purity Seal. It was glued in, but if you really wanted it for your Space Marine cosplay you could pry it out. I don’t know anyone who actually did this, but it was the source of the first resin-copy-casts! Many copies of the “wax” seal were sold at conventions. Mine’s beat up, but I’ll not trade it for anything.

Sixth Edition

Probably the prettiest of the limited editions before GW went whole hog, this featured a cover which folded out into a beautiful impression of a cathedral wall, with windows showing artwork of various Imperial Figures. The actual box was a slipcover of sorts which was a top-loader and the book was stored within.

Seventh Edition

Whoo-boy. The seventh edition of Warhammer 40K was the last of what I consider to be the “third era” of the game and the one where I spent most of my playtime. I’ll pontificate on this in another article, but basically the game was fundamentally unchanged from the 3rd through the 7th editions. There were many rules tweaks over the years, but the basics never changed. The end of seventh edition is where GW finally started to move the timeline forward!

It was also where GW went absolutely overboard in their limited editions. In addition to this rulebook set, individual codexii also received the limited edition treatment. It was a marked change on GWs part, and was the very end of Jack Kirby’s tenure. This edition was served up in a shiny happy box and had many extra such as metal coin tokens, art cards, as well as the new psychic powers and tactical objective cards!

Eighth Edition

Games Workshop continued their assault on the bank accounts of their players with the release of the 8th edition collector’s box. It came with a miniature version of the rulebook (handy!) an art and background books a map of the 40K galaxy, the now standard metal objective tokens, a metal measuring device for coherency, tactical objective cards, and a felt bag with metal SKULLZ for wound markers. The whole box opened up to slide out the contents.

8th edition was the first major revamp of the Warhammer 40k rules since 3rd. Overnight, everything a 40K player owned rules-wise (and some miniatures) was rendered obsolete. Folks who experienced the 9th to 10th edition transition know how everyone feels!

I feel this special edition was a major step down from the 7th edition version. The box was much simpler, and the contents a lot more bland. The map was a nice touch, to be sure, but overall it felt very monochrome as opposed to the technicolor of the previous edition! Grimdark forever, I guess.

Ninth Edition

Quite frankly, 9th edition was a complete letdown when it came to the limited edition. A return to only a fancy core rulebook, with the various special tokens and such being spread out into individual special edition codexii. I haven’t picked one of these up yet, as the price is still pretty steep on the secondary market and my interest is limited to historical curiosity, so I have grabbed photos from the official Games Workshop Warhammer Community. This was referred to as the “Indomitus Edition”.

9th edition was the end of the short-lived (only two editions!) fourth era of Warhammer 40K. This upset a lot of people, but not enough to end GW’s resurgent dominance of tabletop wargaming in the USA.

Tenth Edition

Somewhat of a return to form, this edition gives us a cool slipbox, the rulebook, a folder containing various art cards, a reference sheet, and the standard metal coin token objective markers. Still not as cool as the full boxes of the 7th/8th edition era, but definitely a step up from 4th through 6th, and a major return to form after the disappointment of 9th.

10th edition completely wiped out everyone’s investment in the rules and their codexii, after a comparatively very short time period. In addition, vast selections of miniatures across all lines have also been Squatted…

I definitely hope to pick one of these up once they drop back below the current secondary market prices! Again, pictures from Warhammer Community, not my collection.

Bonus! Warhammer 40K: Apocalypse

GW released an extra special edition of their Apocalypse Rules. This wasn’t really timed for any major releases of the main line of rules, but it is definitely the most impressive box in my opinion. It came with neatly-thread-bound rules, reference sheets, a Inquisitorial notebook containing the Apocalypse rules, and a pile of unit cards, along with the strategic assets deck and an art “book”, Pluvian’s Fighting Formations & Engines of War 974.M41 which folded out into various GW dioramas showing off the range of Apocalypse miniatures! At this time, massive machines like Baneblades and such were not really seen in regular 40K, but with the release of plastic kits like the Imperial Guard Baneblade and Khorne Lord of Skulls, players wanted bigger and better battles…

All of the various books were printed as if they were actual in-world items, making them great for cosplay and other displays. The piece de resistance of this box was the inside cover, which was a Writ of Exeterminatus! This piece of paper held the individual number for the set, and was just a cool piece of in-world ephemera.

Conclusion

So there you have it! All of the Games Workshop Warhammer 40,000 special limited collector ninja tiger dragon rules I’ve been able to track down! I hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane.