Da Orks are Coming! A Review

The new edition of Warhammer 40,000 is finally getting its first Codex, and Games Workshop certainly picked the right faction to kick things off. Codex: Orks leads a genuinely substantial green tide of new and refreshed kits, standalone Armageddon releases, gaming accessories, and Black Library books.

For Ork players, this is less of a token launch wave and more of a full faction refresh. There are new characters, updated staples, returning kits from Armageddon, and enough rules support to make this feel like the proper beginning of the new edition.

There are a few availability quirks this week, though. The Special Edition Codex: Orks will not be available for preorder through Wargame Portal, but we have something a little different planned. Five lucky customers who preorder the regular Codex: Orks from us will have their order upgraded to the Special Edition at no additional cost.

The Deathwatch Special Edition novel, meanwhile, is not being offered to third-party retailers. The Made to Order Skaven and Middle-earth releases are also direct-only, so those will need to be ordered through Games Workshop.

Codex: Orks Leads the Waaagh!

The biggest release here is naturally Codex: Orks, and being the first Codex of the new edition puts quite a bit of pressure on it.

On paper, though, this looks like a very healthy start.

There are 15 detachments, an expanded Waaagh! army rule, and datasheets covering more than 50 Ork units. That alone gives Ork players a significant amount of room to build armies around wildly different themes rather than funneling everyone toward the same handful of competitive archetypes.

More interesting is what Games Workshop is doing with the app code included with the Codex. Instead of simply unlocking a digital copy of the printed rules, the code is intended to provide ongoing access to rules updates, additional detachments, new lore, and hobby content as it is released.

That potentially makes the physical Codex feel more like the starting point for an army rather than a book that begins aging the moment it hits shelves.

And then there is the Special Edition.

We will not have it available as a normal preorder item at Wargame Portal, but five customers who purchase the standard Codex through us will receive a free upgrade to the Special Edition version. Same rules inside, but with the hardback presentation, foil detailing, green-edged pages, and ribbon marker.

Consider it a little extra loot for five members of the Waaagh!.

Nazdreg Finally Returns

One of the more exciting models in the entire wave is Nazdreg.

The Bad Moons have always had one of the strongest visual identities among the Ork clans, and bringing one of their most famous Warbosses back to the tabletop feels long overdue.

Nazdreg comes absolutely buried in the sort of excessive weaponry you'd expect from an Ork who has enough teef to buy basically anything he wants. Between the Moonchewa power klaw and the delightfully over-engineered Kustom Blasta X, he looks exactly like a Bad Moons warlord should.

More importantly, bringing named characters like Nazdreg back gives the faction some personality beyond simply updating generic units. This is the sort of release we like seeing alongside a new Codex.

A Proper New Warboss

The new Warboss is another standout.

Generic character kits live or die by customization, and Games Workshop appears to have leaned into that here. The kit includes weapon options, interchangeable heads and jaws, different boss pole pieces, and even an attack squig.

That makes it a much more useful release than a highly posed monopose character that every Ork army would eventually duplicate.

You can make him yours, which is exactly how an Ork Warboss kit should work.

The Mek Gets to Work

The new Mek isn't quite as flashy as Nazdreg or the Warboss, but he's arguably one of the most characterful miniatures in the wave.

He's surrounded by tools, mechanical bits, and even his own little battlefield crane, perfectly capturing the idea of an Ork mechanic desperately keeping a collection of barely functioning war machines moving forward.

For vehicle-heavy armies, he's going to look right at home walking behind a convoy of Trukks, Dreads, and whatever other pile of scrap your Mek insists is completely safe.

Probably.

New Boyz Are a Big Deal

The humble Ork Boy may not have the same shelf presence as a giant centerpiece model, but this could quietly be one of the most important releases of the wave.

Boyz are the foundation of countless Ork armies, and the updated kit finally gives them a much broader range of equipment.

Each Boy carries a shoota, slugga, and choppa, while the unit can add a big shoota, rokkit launcha, and burna. The Nob naturally gets access to a power klaw because rank has its privileges.

This is exactly the sort of core infantry refresh that makes an army feel genuinely new rather than simply attaching a Codex to an existing model range.

Warbikers Come Screaming Back

The refreshed Warbikers look like exactly what Ork bikes should be: loud, armored, ridiculous, and designed with little regard for the continued health of the rider.

The new kit keeps that ramshackle Ork construction while packing the bikes with dakkaguns and giving the squad leader access to a kombi-rokkit.

They're not reinventing the concept here, and they don't need to. This is simply a much-needed modern version of a classic Ork unit.

The Trukk Gets a Long-Overdue Update

If there is one kit in this release that desperately deserved some attention, it's the Ork Trukk.

The new version retains the cobbled-together aesthetic that makes Ork vehicles so much fun, but adds plenty of customization through optional parts like the grabbin' klaw, buzzsaw, and enormous spiked ram.

That's exactly the right approach.

Ork vehicles shouldn't look like they came off an assembly line. They should look like somebody found three wrecked vehicles, a generator, six sheets of metal, and a bad idea.

The new Trukk appears to understand the assignment.

The Command Pack Is Actually Pretty Interesting

The Orks Command Pack represents another change for the new edition.

Rather than splitting cards and tokens across separate accessory releases, Games Workshop is bundling them together into one package containing 94 reference cards covering all 15 Codex detachments and 36 double-sided tokens for tracking rules and statuses.

Whether you personally prefer physical cards or using the app will determine how useful this is, but for players who like having their rules spread out directly beside the table, this seems like a much more complete accessory than previous card releases.

There's also the obligatory faction dice set, this time in mottled green with red pips and an Ork icon replacing the six.

Because apparently regular dice aren't Orky enough.

Armageddon Starts Breaking Apart

Several models previously bundled into Warhammer 40,000: Armageddon are also getting their individual releases.

That includes the Big Mek Dakkarig, Weirdboy, Wartrakk, and Kommand Krew containing the Bannernob, Bigboss, Painboy, and grot orderly.

We always like seeing boxed-set miniatures make the jump to individual releases. It gives existing Ork collectors a much easier way to pick up the models they actually want without purchasing an entire boxed game around them.

The Dakkarig in particular is exactly the sort of absurd Ork contraption that tends to become an army centerpiece whether it was intended to or not.

Made to Order Skaven

Away from Warhammer 40,000, Games Workshop is opening the archives for another round of Made to Order Skaven miniatures.

The lineup includes a substantial collection of classic characters:

• Ikit Claw

• Throt the Unclean

• Lord Skrolk

• Tretch Craventail

• Queek Headtaker

• Skweel Gnawtooth

• Plaguelord Nurglitch

• Warlord Spinetail

• Deathmaster Snikch

• Classic Verminlord

• Warpgnaw Verminlord

There are some genuinely iconic sculpts in that list, particularly for longtime Skaven collectors.

These are Games Workshop direct Made to Order releases and will not be available through Wargame Portal.

Middle-earth Gets Its Own Classics

The Middle-earth Strategy Battle Game also gets a Made to Order wave featuring returning Elves and Dwarves.

The releases include classic Lórien bowmen, Guards of the Galadhrim Court, Khazad-dûm Warriors, Dwarven Bowmen, commanders, and Galadriel, Protectress of Lothlorien.

Again, these are Made to Order direct releases, so third-party retailers will not have them available.

Deathwatch Gets the Collector Treatment

Steve Parker's Deathwatch returns in a new Special Edition after winning the 2025 Reader's Choice vote.

It's a well-earned return for one of the better-known Deathwatch stories, following Talon Squad into the world of 31-Caro on a mission from an Inquisitor Lord.

This one will likely attract plenty of attention from Black Library collectors, but there is an important availability note: the Deathwatch Special Edition is not being supplied to third-party retailers, so we will not have it available at Wargame Portal.

Ghazghkull Gets Illustrated and Annotated

The Black Library release we're particularly interested in is the new Illustrated and Annotated Edition of Ghazghkull Thraka: Prophet of the Waaagh!

Nate Crowley's story of Ghazghkull's rise, filtered through Makari's extremely trustworthy recollection of events, was already one of the more entertaining modern Ork novels.

Adding author annotations and new illustrations makes this feel like one of those editions that actually gives existing owners a reason to consider reading the book again rather than simply putting a different cover on it.

And with the rest of this preorder wave being so heavily focused on Ghazghkull's Waaagh!, the timing couldn't really be better.

Bjorn: The Fell-Handed

The new Bjorn: The Fell-Handed hardback from Justin D Hill shifts things over to Fenris, where the legendary Dreadnought finds himself facing the Death Guard.

Bjorn is one of those characters with enough history behind him that a dedicated novel almost writes itself, and getting a story centered around the oldest living Space Marine should make this one worth watching for Space Wolves fans.

Demolisher Rolls Into Paperback

Finally, Demolisher by Andy Clark arrives in paperback.

The follow-up to Steel Tread once again follows Hadeya Etsul and the crew of the Leman Russ Demolisher Steel Tread, this time escorting a commissar through hostile territory while dealing with problems both outside and inside the tank.

It isn't the headline of this week's Black Library selection, but readers who enjoyed Steel Tread finally have an easy way to continue the story.

A Very Strong Start for the New Edition

As the first major Codex release of the new edition, this is a pretty convincing opening salvo.

The Orks aren't just receiving a book and one new character. They're getting new core infantry, characters, vehicles, bikes, accessories, and individual releases from Armageddon, while one of the faction's most famous characters returns in the form of Nazdreg.

More importantly, most of these releases address parts of the range that actually needed attention.

The new Boyz and Trukk help modernize the army's foundations, the customizable Warboss provides a proper generic leader kit, and the Armageddon solo releases give existing collectors access to models without forcing them into another large box.

Add in a Codex containing 15 detachments and the new evolving digital support through the Warhammer 40,000 app, and Ork players have a lot to dig into.

For Wargame Portal customers, Codex: Orks and the main Ork release wave will be rolling into preorder, with one extra wrinkle: five regular Codex preorders will be randomly upgraded to the Special Edition Codex at no additional cost.

The Deathwatch Special Edition, Ork Special Edition Codex, Made to Order Skaven, and Made to Order Middle-earth miniatures are direct-only and will not be available through third-party retailers.

The Waaagh! is coming.

And for the first Codex wave of the new edition, Games Workshop has gone properly loud.