Warhammer Fantasy 8th Edition: You're Going To Need More Elves

[Funka Genocide]

So as an itinerant Warhammer fan boy I thought I'd start a discussion on the upcoming 8th edition, released this Friday I believe.

The rules have been updated to form a more streamlined process, a lot of people say it's similar to the Lord of The Rings game published by the same company. I'm all for the removal of useless minutiae and a faster playstyle, however what worries me is the emphasis on larger unit sizes.

I've had a chance to take a cursory look through the new rulebook and read a bit through various online sources and it looks like the horde army will rise ascendant. Gone are the days of your 5 strong unit of uber-knights running roughshod over even the sturdiest of defenders, now giant blocks of simple spearmen will carry the day!

I'll need to play some games and get my hands on the new rule book before passing judgment, but are any of you Warhammer fans out there preparing for mass upheaval?

(Also the new boxed set will be high elves and skaven, with a lot of nice goodies for both. Feel free to discuss that, the upcoming errata or anything else you feel pertinent to the new release.)

[krogothwolf]

I'm not prepared. I enjoyed playing my Knights Orderly to destroy enemies! I don't really feel like buying more normal units now just t field a competitive army.

It always seems they start making things simpilar and simpilar for people They stupidfy rules and then leave things plastered with question marks and vague answers so you have to create house rules anyways to play a game. I was just getting used to 7th and now they release 8th! blah! And I'm just coping with the revamp of 40k. Although, I must admit my Blood Angels are a clusterfuck of destruction now.

Anyways. I'm curious to see what they'll do to magic and special characters. They've been nuking them for ages, which is good in someways yet stupid in others.

I hope my Lizardmen aren't forgotten about till last this time though. I love my Lizards more then my empire but the wait for the army book was a pissant so I barely used them because they were weaker.

[Funka Genocide]

I think what it amounts to is an emphasis on larger unit size, I'm approximating about double what you'd see today. Whereas only the cheapest of armies would dream of fielding units 30+ in size, and a unit of 20 is "big" You're going to see Horde armies fielding units in the 50s and 20 being an average unit size.

Cavalry and monstrous units like ogres and trolls will likely be in at least 2 ranks.

Smaller elite units won't have such a large impact, I feel they'll mainly be used to deny rank bonuses and to hammer the nail in the coffin your larger units have all ready constructed.

Then again most of this is conjecture since I haven't played a game yet. I like the randomized charge distance rule though. There needs to be more of an element of risk to the game. Knowing that you're cold one knights will make 14 inches isn't terribly exciting, you just have to engineer the condition where they can charge without fear of missing. Now even from 10 inches away you might miss it, or you can go for a long shot and hope the dice favor you. Even Stunties can threaten you from half the board away.

The emphasis on initiative also seems intriguing. Whereas you could charge and get the first swing before, now if you're fighting a faster army your first attacks aren't guaranteed, although I think there is a rule changing how counter attacks are handled. Butchering the first row entirely will no longer remove your opponents ability to fight back.

[krogothwolf]

I think that's a little bit ridiculous to be honest. Randomizing charge distance removes the tactical part of charges now and makes it insanly stupid. You're not suppose to measure for a charge anyways so you have to guess on that you've figure it out right before charging. Not that it's that hard but it's still a better system then randomize charge differences.

They should have had somehting that allows a unit to move half distance and brace for a charge that way you can either negate or dampen the charge. Spearmen should be able to win against a charge if they brace for it, or at least have the chance to win against a charge.

Your making this sound more like a freakin cash grab even more then the previous editions. Because if this is true, My 2k army is now roughly 1k and will require me to purchase more mini's just to be able to field a decently sized one.

The Elite unit thing makes a little sense, but it still seems pointless. They were never that indestructible anyways but they could handle specific types of units pretty well, while others poorly. I really dislike the idea of having even more units needed to field a decent army.

[Funka Genocide]

well they didn't change point values so the size will remain rougly consistant, its just unit size that might see a change. More of your points will go to less units pretty much, the net effect being the same number of models organized into a different number of units.

Although in smaller games around 2000 points or so I don't really think an army will have more than one larger horde unit. I believe they're changing it to be more objective based so you'll probably want one large unit to sit on top of an objective and smaller, more maneuverable units to run around causing mayhem.

Again its really a matter of army and playstyle. If we take an example of polar opposites, skaven against high elves, you could easily have 50 clan rats with spears, maybe even 2 such units.

However, even with such numbers, a unit of 20 swordmasters will more than likely decimate the rats.

basically, Your first rank can attack with its full compliment of attacks, then your second rank can attack with one supporting attack per model. Spears add another rank of attacks and being 10 wide (horde formation) adds another. So a standard unit with spears and 10 models wide can attack in 4 ranks, high elves can attack in 5 ranks.

But take those 20 swordmasters into 4 ranks of 5 against those 50 clan rats. We start to see some interesting interactions.

First, the swordmasters get 15 attacks at initiative 6 and strength 5. 10 from the front rank (2 attacks each) and 1 supporting attack from each model in the second rank.

Now lets look at the clan rats. They will be attacking in 4 ranks, but since they're fighting a frontage of 5, they will only get 20 attacks. Then its just a matter of comparing the quality of those attacks. 15 ws6, str 5 attacks before 20 ws3 s3 attacks.

You can count on the swordmasters cleaving through between 8 and 9 clan rats before the counter attacks, which should only garner about 3 to 4 casualties. They'll both have the same rank bonus and whoever charged will have +1. I think the larger unit might get a further +1 but still, its a resounding victory for the swordmasters anyways you slice it.

It looks like smaller, more elite units can really tear the heart of of larger blocks of troops, though being a horde makes them stubborn so its likely that even after being thrashed those larger blocks will stick around.

[DarkDrgon]

I'd like WHF better if I could use Mantic Games models. They just look better and are a better value to me.