Warhammer 40,000: Tacticus basics

Factions & Grand Alliances

Every Character belongs to one of 22 Factions, and every Faction belongs to one of 3 Grand Alliances: Imperial, Xenos, or Chaos. Alliance membership matters a lot — several game modes restrict who you can squad together by Alliance rather than by the tighter Faction.

A roster of 117 playable Characters plus 11 vehicle/monster "Machines of War" is spread across these Factions, so most Factions field a handful of Characters rather than dozens.

Base Rarity vs. Ascension

Base Rarity is a fixed fact about a specific Character — the tier they're recruited at (Common through Legendary). It's not a choice you make; it's baked into who that Character is.

Ascension is the separate, universal system that lets every Character climb from their own Base Rarity all the way up to Mythic — six tiers in total: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, Legendary, Mythic. Each Ascension step raises active and passive ability power by roughly 20%, and unlocks a higher Level cap and Rank ceiling.

Level is capped per rarity tier — Common tops out around Level 8, Uncommon 17, Rare 26, Epic 35, Legendary 50, and Mythic 60. Ascending to the next rarity is what raises the cap so you can keep leveling.

Equipment

Every Character has 3 Equipment slots. Slot 1 always takes a Crit Item (crit chance/damage). Slot 2 takes a defense item — either a Block-type (block chance) or a Defensive-type (armour/health) piece, fixed per Character. Slot 3 is a Booster, which unlocks once the Character reaches Rare — either a Block Booster or a Crit Booster, again fixed per Character. A handful of Characters run an exception to this pattern (two Crit items instead of a Booster, or two Defensive pieces with no Booster at all) — see the Recommended Build box on their own page.

Equipment has its own 6-tier rarity ladder (Common through Mythic) separate from a Character's own rarity. Pieces are forged up in level with Coins, and ascended to a higher rarity with Forge Badges.

Badges & Orbs

Faction Ability Badges upgrade a Character's Active/Passive abilities beyond their base rarity growth — mainly earned from Onslaught and Guild Raid rewards.

Forge Badges are spent to ascend Equipment (and other Badges/Orbs) to a higher rarity, not to upgrade a Character directly.

Orbs are what actually ascend a Character to their next rarity tier, alongside that Character's own shards — Alliance-wide Legendary and Mythic Orbs are shared across every Character in that Alliance at the top tiers.

Currencies

Coins — the everyday currency: shop purchases, forging Equipment/Badges/Orbs, and levelling abilities.

Blackstone — the premium currency (real-money purchasable); spent on store items, energy refreshes, and Requisition Drops pulls.

Shards — Character-specific; unlock and help ascend a given Character. Earned from requisition orders, missions, and battle rewards.

Guild Credits — earned from Guild Raid boss damage; spent in the Guild Shop on shards, Badges, Orbs, and XP books.

Archeotech — an end-game currency from trading excess shards; spent on shards, legendary Equipment, premium avatars, and XP books.

Energy — required for campaign battles (6 per attempt); regenerates over time or refills with Blackstone/ads.

Raid Tickets — spent alongside Energy to re-raid an already-completed campaign battle for rewards without replaying it.

Requisition Drops

Requisition Drops is the game's gacha layer on top of normal shard farming — a single pull costs 1 Requisition Scroll or 300 Blackstone, and a 10-pull (10 Scrolls or 3,000 Blackstone) guarantees a full Character rather than random shards.

Unlike most gacha games, Requisition Drops isn't the only way to a new Character — most of the roster is earned by clearing content and farming that Character's own shard source over time. The named "Legendary Character Event" Characters are the exception: those are only obtainable during their own time-limited event.

Game modes

Squad-building rules change completely depending on the mode you're playing — this is the single biggest thing to learn early.