On May 25, Games Workshop plans to broadcast the first ever public games of Warhammer 40k 11th edition, with a 12 hour long livestream of exhibition matches. The headline bout is a rematch of the 2025 World Championships finals, between Richard Siegler, the reigning Warhammer 40k World Champion, and his opponent Liam VSL. Will the decisive clash play out differently under the new rules?
Both players will field the same Warhammer 40k factions they used in the 2025 finals, with Siegler piloting his Adeptus Mechanicus against Liam VSL’s Aeldari. Their game will start at 3.30pm PDT / 6.30pm EDT / 11.30pm BST, and will be broadcast live from the Esports Stadium Arlington, in Texas, via the official Warhammer channels on Twitch and YouTube.
In a post on Warhammer Community, GW states that their armies have been “tailored slightly for the new edition” – but as Liam VSL is confirmed to be bringing three Phoenix Lords to the fight, just as he did in the 2025 World Championships, this may really be as close to a rematch as the new edition will allow.
Both players’ lists were extremely mobile and greatly favored infantry: Siegler maxed out on Pteraxii Skystalkers and Sicarian Infiltrators with support from a max-size force of Ironstrider Balistarii, while Liam VSL’s Aspect Host was packed with Swooping Hawks, Warp Spiders, and Dark Reapers. The outcome of the finals remained in the balance until the very end, so the rematch promises to be an exciting trial by fire for the new edition.
The world championship rematch will be the last of three exhibition games played on stream on May 25. Starting at 7am PDT / 10am EDT / 3pm BST, Adrian Phillips will field the Blood Angels against the Orks, commanded by Paul Murphy. Both players are using the models from the upcoming Armageddon launch box set as the core of their army, expanded out to a full 2,000 points.
GW helpfully lets us know the full list of minis they’ll be fielding, which gives us an idea of roughly what it’ll take to go from the launch box set up to a full army. To take the Space Marines half of Armageddon up to 2,000 points, you’ll need a force equivalent to:
- Brutalis Dreadnought
- Ballistus Dreadnought
- Redemptor Dreadnought
- Gladiator Reaper
- Gladiator Lancer
- Lieutenant with Combi-Weapon
- 5x Terminators with Teleport Homer
- 5x Desolation Squad
And to get the Ork army up to that sweet 2,000 points, you’re looking at something like:
- 10x Kommandos
- 6x Tankbustas
- 6x Deffkoptas
- 6x Meganobz
- Morkanaut
- Ghazghkull Thraka
After that, at 11.30am PDT / 2.30pm EDT / 7.30pm BST, PlayOnTabletop’s Nick will field the T’au Empire against his fellow presenter Tak’s Death Guard in a more narrative-heavy clash. The slow, durable, close-ranged Death Guard and the nimble, fairly fragile, long-ranged T’au have diametrically opposed play-styles, so this game promises to be an excellent test for how well the new asymmetrical mission system generates dramatic match-ups between wildly different forces.
If you’re planning to tune in, why not hang out in the Wargamer Discord community and discuss the games as they happen?
Source: Wargamer
