Beginner's 40k
Guide contents (7 of 10)
  1. What you need before you start
  2. Building a legal list
  3. How to read a datasheet
  4. Setup: terrain, missions, deployment
  5. The battle round and every phase
  6. Resolving an attack
  7. Scoring and winning
  8. Ten mistakes new players make
  9. What to do after game one
  10. Glossary

Scoring and winning

You don't win Warhammer 40,000 by wiping out your opponent's army — you win by scoring more victory points than them by the end of the game. Destroying units is usually a means to that end, not the goal itself.

Primary and secondary victory points

Your mission gives you a primary objective — usually about controlling parts of the table — and, in most missions, a choice of secondary objectives on top of that. You track these separately, then add them together for your total.

[VERIFY] How many secondary objectives you get, when you choose them, and whether there's a cap on how many points you can score per round or per game are set by your mission pack, not the Core Rules — this site doesn't encode mission content (see the setup guide), so check your own mission card or app.

Objective control

Controlling an objective depends on which player has the higher total of a stat called Objective Control (OC) among their models within range of it — not simply "whoever has a model there". Some units are much better at holding ground than others, and a battle-shocked unit's OC drops to nothing until it recovers.

At the end of every phase and turn, both players add up the OC of all their models within range of an objective (within its terrain area, or within 3" of an objective marker if it isn't tied to terrain). Whoever has the higher total controls it; if both players are tied, neither does — unless the objective is secured. Some rules let a player's army secure an objective, which means they keep control of it even after they no longer have any units in range, until their opponent's control becomes higher than theirs. This is the official version of what the community often calls a "sticky objective".

How the game ends and a winner is decided

At the end of the last battle round, whoever has the higher total victory points (primary plus secondary) wins. Beyond defining the battle round and phase structure, the Core Rules don't set victory conditions or tie-break rules themselves — your mission pack does. This site deliberately doesn't encode mission content, so check your own mission card or app for the exact tie-break.

The turn tracker tallies primary and secondary points separately for both players throughout the game so you always know the running score, whatever your mission's tie-break rule turns out to be.