Warhammer 40k Rules for Beginners | Command Points and Objectives

Warhammer 40,000 is a two player tabletop wargame for ages 12 and up where a 2,000 point game takes two to three hours, and the four rules that decide almost every battle are command points, objectives, battle-shock rolls and the hit, wound, save sequence.

I’m Spector, a dad to Alex, 7, and Emma, 10. This is the game on the shelf that my wife and I play on Saturday mornings while the kids are out, and it is the one game in our house I would not hand to a seven year old. That is not a complaint about the game. It is the most strategically rich thing we own, and it is also a hobby that asks for two to three hours and a table the size of a dining table.

One thing to clear up before anything else, because the old version of this page got it badly wrong. There is no board game called Warhammer 40k: Grim Darkness Tactics. No publisher makes it, Games Workshop does not make it, and it does not appear anywhere in the official rules. What Games Workshop publishes is Warhammer 40,000 itself, a miniature wargame with dice, a tape measure, and a free Core Rules PDF. Everything below is transcribed from that document, with its section numbers, so you can check me.

There Is No Board Game Called Grim Darkness Tactics

I have to say this plainly because the previous version of this page reviewed a product that does not exist. The old page described a grid based skirmish game with a 3x3 or 4x4 play area, a hand of command cards you drew at the start of each turn, a deck building element, an overwatch mechanic, a defender who reacts during your turn, and solo rules driven by a behaviour chart.

None of those things are in Warhammer 40,000. Here is what I checked and how I know.

• The official 11th edition Core Rules PDF, published openly by Games Workshop, downloaded and read in full. Twenty five numbered sections, from Core Concepts to Muster Armies. No product called Grim Darkness Tactics in it.
• The official 10th edition Core Rules PDF and the official Quick Start Guide, both downloaded and read the same way. Same result.
• The Games Workshop Wiki’s own list of every 40,000 game from 1987 onward. No Grim Darkness Tactics, and no 40,000 board game of that name.
• BoardGameGeek, searched three times for the title and for the other name this slug has been confused with, Massive Battles. All three searches return no items.

The command card hand, the overwatch, the reactive defender and the solo behaviour chart are not sloppy details. They are a different game in the writer’s head, and a parent who bought on that page would have bought the wrong thing. Warhammer 40,000 is strictly alternating. You take your whole turn, I take my whole turn, and nothing of mine happens while you are moving.

What Warhammer 40,000 Actually Is

Warhammer 40,000 is a two player miniature wargame published by Games Workshop, played over five battle rounds, with each turn made up of five phases: Command, Movement, Shooting, Charge and Fight. You win by scoring more victory points than your opponent from the mission’s objectives, not by wiping the enemy army out.

The rules are free. Games Workshop publishes the Core Rules as a PDF you can download, and the app adds expanded reference features plus an army builder. That matters for a parent, because the rulebook is not the entry cost. The miniatures are.

A game unfolds like this:

• A battle round is one turn from each player. A battle usually lasts for five battle rounds, and at the end of them one player is the victor.
• Each player’s turn has five phases, in order: Command, Movement, Shooting, Charge, Fight.
• A mission sets the battlefield size, where objectives go, and what you need to do to win. You generate it from a mission deck before the game.
• You win on victory points, scored from objectives. Recovering relics, holding ground, and killing characters are all mission specific.

That last point is the one the old page buried. Warhammer 40,000 is a scoring game. Annihilating your opponent is worth whatever your mission says it is worth, which is often nothing at all. A player who wipes the enemy army and loses every objective has lost the game.

Command Points, the One Resource You Spend

Both players gain 1 Command Point in the Gain Core CP step of the Command phase, every turn. Command Points buy stratagems, which are rules that cost CP and give you a one off effect like a free charge or a shooting modifier.

Section 08.02 is two lines long. Both players gain 1 Command Point. The sidebar puts it plainer: the Gain Core CP step ensures that both players gain 1 CP each turn. Some character abilities and faction rules grant extra CP on top of that, so a well built army can be sitting on a bank of points by the back half of the game.

Command Points do exactly one thing, and that is spend them on stratagems. Section 15 says each stratagem states how many CP it costs, when it can be used, which units it targets, what it does, and any restrictions. The two limits worth knowing before your first game are that you cannot use the same stratagem more than once in the same phase, and that you cannot target a battle-shocked unit with a stratagem at all.

This is where the old page’s “hold a command card back for a desperate defensive maneuver” came from, except there are no cards. You are balancing a number, and the interesting decision is whether to spend three points now to guarantee a kill or keep them for the objective you are about to lose.

Objectives and the Objective Control Statistic

An objective is a terrain area on the battlefield. You control it by having models with an Objective Control, or OC, characteristic worth 1 or more inside it, and at the end of every phase both players add up their OC totals in that area. Highest total controls it, and on a tie neither player controls it unless the objective is secured.

This is the 11th edition change that most often gets misreported, and it is the mechanic that decides more games than shooting does. Three rules, straight from section 14.

How you take one. To gain control you need one or more of your models with an OC characteristic of 1 or more within range of the objective. A model is within range of a terrain objective while it is inside that terrain area, and the mission’s deployment map says where the areas are. If a mission puts an objective somewhere that is not a terrain area, you mark it with a flat circular marker 40mm across, and a model counts as in range of that marker at 3” horizontally and 5” vertically.

How you score it. At the end of each phase and turn, both players add together the OC characteristics of all their own models within range. The higher total controls the objective. If the two totals are equal, then unless the objective is secured, neither player controls it. Nobody gets it for showing up.

How you keep it. Some rules let an army secure an objective. Once secured, it stays under your control even when you have nothing left standing in the area, and your opponent only takes it back by beating your level of control at the end of a phase.

The practical consequence is that OC is a real stat to buy, not a footnote. A unit with a low OC can be physically sitting on an objective and still lose it, because your opponent brought three more models than you did. That is the whole reason an army list is not just a list of weapons.

Battle-Shock, the Rule That Replaced Morale Breaks

Battle-shock is the 11th edition morale mechanic. In the Command phase, the active player makes one battle-shock roll, which is 2D6, for each unit that is already battle-shocked or at, or below, half-strength. A failed roll sets that unit’s OC to nothing, stops you targeting it with stratagems, and blocks it from starting an action.

The old page described units making morale checks and then pinning, retreating, or routing. There is no pinning and there is no rout in this game. There is a battle-shock roll, and it does three specific things when it fails.

The roll itself is a leadership roll, which means 2D6. You succeed if you roll equal to or greater than the unit’s Ld. On a fail:

1. The OC characteristic of every model in the unit is modified to ”-”, so it cannot hold an objective at all.
2. Its controlling player cannot target that unit with stratagems, so you lose command points as a punishment.
3. It is not eligible to start an action.

Who gets rolled: section 08.03 says the active player must make one battle-shock roll for each unit in their army that is currently battle-shocked, or is at or below half-strength, or both. So the second time your squad is hit hard enough, it is tested again immediately.

Half-strength is defined precisely in section 01.02.01, and this is the second thing the old page got backwards. For a unit, at half-strength means the number of remaining models is half its starting strength, and below half-strength means fewer than half remain. For a model, it is wounds against its W characteristic. A squad of five down to two is below half-strength. A captain on his own, whose W is not evenly divisible by two, can be below half-strength but can never be at half-strength.

Actions, the Mechanic That Is New in This Edition

Actions are things a unit does instead of fighting. Each action states when it starts, which units can do it, how many times, when it completes and what it does. A unit cannot start an action if it is engaged, is battle-shocked, made an advance or fall-back move this turn, or already started one this turn, and starting one costs it its shooting and its charge for the turn.

Section 16 is new in this edition and the sidebar says so: actions represent vital battlefield tasks your forces must carry out, from searching for missing archeotech to completing a blasphemous ritual. Every action is written in the same five part shape, and once you have read one you can read all of them.

• STARTS: when it is started.
• UNITS: which of your units can perform it.
• USE LIMIT: how many times your units can start it.
• COMPLETES: when it finishes.
• EFFECT: what happens when it does.

The cost is the part that catches people out. A unit is not eligible to start an action if it is off the battlefield, is an AIRCRAFT or FORTIFICATION unit, is battle-shocked, has an OC of 0 or ”-”, is engaged unless it is a TITANIC unit, made an advance or fall-back move this turn, or already started an action this turn. And once it starts one, until the end of the turn that unit is not eligible to shoot, excluding TITANIC, and cannot declare a charge.

So an action is a whole turn for that unit. If you have a unit with a good action, it is a shooting unit this turn and a utility unit next turn, and you are choosing which. Actions themselves are not in the Core Rules. The document tells you they are found in other publications such as mission packs, that all players can use core actions, and that other actions may carry army faction restrictions.

How an Attack Actually Resolves

Every attack runs the same four steps: hit roll, wound roll, save roll, then damage. One D6 per attack die to hit, one D6 per hit to wound, then your opponent rolls to save, subtracting the weapon’s Armour Penetration. Reduce a model’s Wounds to zero or fewer and it is destroyed.

Section 05 is four steps, and the dice are all D6.

Hit roll. One D6 per attack die. An unmodified 1 fails. An unmodified 6 is a critical hit, which is also a hit. A result equal to or greater than the weapon’s BS or WS is a hit. Anything else fails.

Wound roll. One D6 per hit. Compare the weapon’s Strength to the target’s Toughness. Strength twice the Toughness or more wounds. Greater wounds. Equal wounds. Less than the Toughness still wounds. Strength half the Toughness or less does not wound, and so fails.

Save roll. Your opponent rolls one D6 per wound. Invulnerable Save is checked before armour, and if the model has one, a result equal to or higher beats the attack. Then armour: after the weapon’s AP modifies the result, a result equal to or greater than the model’s Sv means the attack fails. A -1 AP shifts every roll down by one, which is why high AP weapons are the answer to big tanks.

Inflict damage. Wounds lost equal the weapon’s D. If that takes a model’s remaining wounds to 0 or fewer, it is destroyed.

The save roll has an allocation order in section 05.03 that nobody outside the hobby ever mentions, and it is the rule that decides who actually dies. You divide the target unit into groups, one for each CHARACTER model and one for every other group sharing the same W, Sv and InSv. A group containing a model that has already lost wounds must be allocated attacks before any group that has not, and no CHARACTER group can be allocated attacks ahead of a non-CHARACTER group.

That ordering matters. You do not get to spread damage evenly across a squad. You pour it into the already hurt group until it is gone, and then the next one. It is why killing a unit is about volume of fire rather than accuracy.

Infantry, Vehicles and the Armour Rules

Vehicles and Monsters have the FRAME keyword, which means you measure to the closest point on the model rather than its base, and they can move through other models when making a normal or advance move. Engaged Vehicles can be shot at, but every ranged attack against one subtracts 1 from the hit roll.

This is where the old page was most wrong about the game, because it said multi-wound models are damage sponges. It is the other way round. Infantry models are one or two wounds and die to a single bolter. Vehicles and characters have a Wounds characteristic in the double digits, which is what makes them worth points.

Three rules make vehicles play differently.

Frame. Section 17.02 gives many MONSTER and VEHICLE models the FRAME keyword, and for them you measure to and from the closest point on the model, not the base. If a vehicle has no base, you can turn it any amount around its central axis as long as it stays upright. It also means the model can lean out over a terrain boundary and still be inside the terrain area.

Moving through things. Section 17.01 says that each time you make a normal or advance move, MONSTER and VEHICLE models in that unit can be moved through friendly and enemy models, excluding other MONSTER and VEHICLE models. A Land Raider can roll through a line of infantry, and two tanks cannot squeeze through each other.

Shooting at engaged Vehicles. Section 17.03 lets you target an engaged MONSTER or VEHICLE unit with ranged attacks, and every such attack subtracts 1 from the hit roll, excluding attacks made with [CLOSE-QUARTERS] weapons by models in a unit engaged with the target. That penalty is the rule that stops a squad from deleting a tank at 6” while sitting in melee with it. The section also says [BLAST] weapons cannot target an engaged unit, and the FAQ repeats it twice.

Against those rules you have the anti-infantry and anti-vehicle abilities. Section 24.03 gives [ANTI-X Y+], where each unmodified wound roll of Y+ is a critical wound if the target has keyword X. A heavy weapon tagged [ANTI-VEHICLE 4+] is the answer to armour, and infantry tagged [ANTI-INFANTRY 2+] is the answer to a massed squad. Vehicles are not strong because of a big number. They are strong because you have to bring the right tools.

Setup, the Battlefield, and What You Actually Need

Setup is not the hard part. The hard part is the models, and the models are not included unless you buy a starter set.

The battlefield. A mission states the size of the battlefield and gives you a deployment map. You can use any surface, and a table is ideal. Terrain goes down in terrain areas, which you define by placing a boundary such as a mat or a base and putting features inside it, by placing one feature on its own, or by placing two or more features together so they define an area.

The three terrain types. Section 13 splits terrain into three categories and this is the single most useful thing a new player can learn. Exposed terrain offers scant protection and can be crossed freely, with craters, razorwire and scattered debris as examples. Light terrain gives cover but does not slow an advance, with barricades, low walls and statuary. Dense terrain is an obstacle even to the largest war machines and can shelter a whole squad from sight, with buildings, ruins, armoured containers and woods as examples.

The three visibility rules that follow. Dense terrain has the Solid rule, meaning line of sight cannot be drawn across any enclosed gap 3” or less from ground level, which is why a squad in a ruin is genuinely hidden rather than cosmetically hidden. Unless otherwise stated, a model’s detection range is 15”. And a hidden model that is concealed by dense terrain has 3” subtracted from its detection range, which is the go to ground bonus. Terrain is the cheapest advantage in the game, and it costs cardboard.

On the table you need standard six sided dice, a tape measure, your army, terrain, and your mission. The old page’s “custom molded dice” do not exist, which is fine, because a bag of D6 costs almost nothing.

The free stuff versus the expensive stuff. The Core Rules PDF is free, the app is free, and the mission decks are a separate purchase. What you pay for is plastic, and the current Starter Set is the on ramp, containing two full Combat Patrol armies of push-fit miniatures, a Core Rules Book, gaming boards and a set of plastic push-fit terrain, so a complete two army game comes in one box.

The One Table That Answers the Real Buying Question

This is the table I wish I had before we started. The tabletop game and the boxed board games are not substitutes, they are different hobbies with different time commitments, and the honest comparison is hours per play rather than theme.

Game	Players	Age	Play time	What you get	Best for
Warhammer 40,000 Starter Set	2	12 and up	2 to 3 hours	Two Combat Patrol armies, Core Rules Book, gaming boards, push-fit terrain	The hobby itself, and it is a hobby for life
Warhammer 40,000: Kill Team	2 to 4	12 and up	60 to 120 minutes	Two small elite teams and its own ruleset	The gateway if you want the setting in a shorter game
Space Marine: The Board Game	2	12 and up	30 to 60 minutes	Lieutenant Titus against a Tyranid swarm, on a game board	A single tense night of 40,000 in a box
Warhammer Quest: Darkwater	1 to 4	12 and up	45 minutes	49 push-fit miniatures and a co-op dungeon crawl	Groups who want co-op, though it is Age of Sigmar not 40,000

Read that Darkwater row carefully, because it is the one trap. It is a Warhammer game, it is co-op, it is the best value in the list, and it is set in the Mortal Realms of Age of Sigmar rather than the 41st Millennium. If you want grimdark science fiction, it is not the box.

Our House Strategy, Not Official Rules

Everything above is the published game, checked against the Core Rules. The rest is what we do at our table.

1. Score the objective before you shoot. The OC maths is public and exact, so count models rather than guessing. Two squads of five beat one squad of ten on the same objective, and you can see that coming on turn one.
2. Do not overextend on the objective you are already winning. Section 14.03’s secured objectives exist for this. A unit sitting on a secured objective contributes its OC with nothing to shoot, and nothing can shoot it back.
3. Bank command points. One CP a turn plus whatever your characters give you is a real bank by round four. Saving three points for a guaranteed turn winning stratagem beats spending them on a good but optional one.
4. Charge with a purpose, not with everything. A charge gets you Fights First, which matters, but a unit in melee cannot shoot and is now sitting on a priority target list. A charge that does not remove a threat or hold an objective is usually a mistake.
5. Give the kids a job that is not the rules. Emma counts dice for me and calls out the OC totals, which is real arithmetic and real engagement. She is ten and she is not losing a game, and that is the whole point.

Is Warhammer 40,000 a Family Game?

Honestly, on our table, no. Our family game nights are Catan and Sushi Go, and our Sushi Go strategy guide exists for exactly the reason Warhammer 40,000 is not on that list. Warhammer 40,000 asks for two to three hours, a dining table cleared of homework, and the ability to lose a game of thirty decisions and want to play it again. That is a Saturday morning with adults or a determined teenager, not a Tuesday evening with a seven year old.

There is a real argument for it being a family hobby, and Games Workshop publishes a parents guide through its Warhammer Alliance programme that makes it well. The guide frames the hobby as collect, build, paint, play and read, and it is genuinely good on assembly and painting as a skill. Our view is narrower. A 12 year old can play this properly. A 10 year old can paint it with you. A 7 year old wants to know who won and why, and the answer is going to take twenty minutes.

If you want the strategy depth without the hobby commitment, our Lost Cities review is a 2,000 point game you can finish on a date night, and our abstract strategy games with no luck guide covers the games where the dice stop mattering entirely. If the appeal is a big asymmetric war with factions that play differently, Root is the closest thing to a 40,000 feeling in a box that plays in an evening.

One practical thing worth saying. Warhammer 40,000 is a competitive game, every player is trying to score more than the other, and the old page’s cooperative-board-games category was simply wrong. If you are looking for a game where everyone works against the same problem, our team building cooperative games guide is that shelf. And if the reason you are reading about a grim sci-fi war is that your kids like theme more than rules, Dune: Imperium is a better fit for a family table, and Marvel Champions is the one we actually finish on a weeknight.

Warhammer 40,000 Compared With Other War Games

• Choose Warhammer 40,000 for a scored, two player, army building war game where a game runs hours.
• Choose Gloomhaven for a cooperative campaign with a story and a campaign you remember in a year.
• Choose Risk for world conquest in 90 minutes with no miniatures and no rulesbook.
• Choose Unmatched for a fast, punchy two player duel with almost no downtime between turns.
• Choose Puerto Rico for economic strategy that fits in 90 minutes and teaches you to think in systems.
• Choose Sleeping Gods for a campaign where losing a scenario is a plot point rather than a defeat.
• Choose Star Wars: Rebellion for a four hour asymmetric game where the underdog hides a base instead of building an army, which is the same hobby commitment and the same two player evening with an entirely different shape.

Warhammer 40,000 FAQ

How many players does Warhammer 40,000 need?

Two. Warhammer 40,000 is a two player game, and the core game has no official solo ruleset. The rules describe each player taking a turn in each battle round, and the whole ruleset is written around a matched pair of armies and a mission that both players share.

How long does a Warhammer 40,000 game take?

A standard 2,000 point game takes two to three hours, and a first game runs longer than that. Games played casually, with lots of rules lookups and a long chat between turns, regularly stretch past three hours.

What is the minimum age for Warhammer 40,000?

Twelve and up is the honest floor. The guidance Games Workshop publishes recommends their products for ages 12 and over, and the 40,000 boxes carry 14 and even 15 plus retailer ratings. The hobby is a fine one for a determined teenager, and painting is a great activity for a younger child with an adult at the table.

How many command points do you get in Warhammer 40,000?

Both players gain 1 Command Point in the Gain Core CP step of the Command phase, every single turn, and that is the baseline. Character abilities and faction rules hand out extra Command Points on top, which is why some armies sit on a bank of them by the last battle round.

What is an OC characteristic in Warhammer 40,000?

OC stands for Objective Control and it decides who owns a piece of ground. You need models with an OC of 1 or more inside the objective, and at the end of each phase both players add up their OC totals in that area. The higher total controls it, and on a tie nobody controls it unless the objective is secured.

Are there official solo rules for Warhammer 40,000?

No, not in the core game. The Core Rules PDF contains no solo or AI opponent rules, and the community solo systems that exist are third party. If you want to play 40,000 without a second player, the honest answer is to pick up one of the cooperative board games in the table above instead.

What is battle-shock in Warhammer 40,000?

Battle-shock is the morale mechanic, and it replaced the pinning and routing language older guides use. In the Command phase you roll 2D6 for each unit that is already battle-shocked or at, or below, half-strength. A failed roll sets the OC of that unit to nothing, stops you using stratagems on it, and blocks it from starting an action.

How do you win a game of Warhammer 40,000?

By scoring more victory points than your opponent from the objectives in your mission. The Core Rules say outright that games are won by scoring more victory points, and the mission tells you what you need to do. Wiping out the enemy army is worth whatever the mission says it is worth, which is often nothing.

My Warhammer 40,000 Verdict