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And what you are doing is a logical error, which I believe is called 'Argument via force or threat'.

silly, but ok i retract the statement, im sure no one would do more than give the person a good talking too.

The OP is also not breaking any rules...

bull.
if your bending a rule to breaking to gain advantage, your playing in an unsportsman like manner. go and try the rule but i wont allow it at the table i play.

If he is a character, the character with the highest leadership MUST be the army general barring a rule specifying otherwise otherwise. Boneripper is a character and does not have a rule specifically saying that he cannot be the general. Thus he must be the general.

nope, i dont buy it. a body gaurd isnt going to be a general, especially a construct that fallows around another character. the Bonerippers job is is protection, not leading. period.

Then find a RULE that says otherwise...

body gaurd of thanquol.

Job done.

I see nothing in that rule that prevents him from being the General.

The main argument here must be Is Boneripper a Character or not. This is the central point and will lead to all the answers.

Those that are for it being a character say the following (correct me if I am wrong)
1. He is selected as part of a lord choice
2. He has a name.
3. Any non mount with a name that is purchased as a lord choice is in fact a character.

Those opposing the fact that he is a character say the following
1. He must be purchased with Thanquol and cannot exist without him, or operate if to far from Thanquol.
2. He is a Rat Ogre (this is a rule not fluff)
3. Has a Rule that indicates he is the bodyguard of Thanquol.

What must be resolved is what makes a character a character. That is not answered in the rules and if any one can point to a rule stating that anything purchased in the Lord or Hero slot that is not ridden by a character is considered to be a character. This rule does not exist, it is something that we just infer.

According to page 97 of the Skaven book, characters come out of the Lord and Hero slots, whereas troops come out of the other slots. As Boneripper comes out of a Lord slot, he is therefore a character unless otherwise stated.

well if thats true you can only use boneripper in the army at 3000 plus points cause if he counts as a lord then hes allowed in a 2000 pt army and up, but what about thanq? you need thanq to run boneripper, thats 2 lord slots by your thinking. BY THE RULES: you can have 2 lords at 3000 points (stated in the chart on page 97). obviously the rule wasnt intened this way but hey neither was boneripper ever intended to be the general....

Yeah!!! fight cheese with cheese!

and here we go, it does not state that they come as a pair (go ahead find where it says), it only says thanq AND boneripper but no where does it say that they are bought together (hey im really getting into this IT DOESNT SAY type of rules interpritation) the points cost for thanq and bone ripper is 450pts a peice. a peice... so to have boneripper you have to pay 900 points. as it clearly does not say that they are bought as a pair.

That's a pretty lame argument. There are lots of entries in army books where you can add things to entries that don't take up an extra slot, both in 40k and Fantasy. I'm pretty sure if I had my book on me that it would be pretty easy to point out what you are brutallizing with that arguement. I'm guessing its on the fact that is, as you said, says Thang and bonripper, which is like anyother combination in fantasy (wood elf sisters, all regiments of renown) where you can't just take 1 character and not the other, or the regiment of renown without it's hero...

but more importantly, JUST GIVE IT UP. The 2 lords argument was shot down already, which is pretty much the same as the 2x points argument. Unless you have something new to add to the debate, just ignore it.

Im making a point that the 2 lords arguement is as silly as boneripper being the general... sacrasm in the face of silly

Given up as requested

skyth wrote:Other than there is no ambiguity in his rules at all.

The simple fact that this thread exists means that there is clearly ambiguity. Your personal opinion on the matter does not mean that there is no ambiguity.

This thread is exactly why RAW is a bad idea. I guarantee you that if we didn't have RAW, this discussion wouldn't be happening.

If you really want to take the position that Boneripper is a Lord-level character, the you MUST take the position that you cannot field Thanquol and Boneripper at less than 3000 points. From the Empire book (as this is repeated verbatim in all other books): "Characters are divided into two categories: Lords and Heroes. The maximum number of characters an army can include is shown on the chart below. Of these, only a certain number can be Lords."

If Boneripper is also a Lord-level character, then you cannot include the pair in anything less than a 3000-point game. To claim otherwise is to pick and choose which rules you're reading by RAW.

Play the Game, not the Rules.

If they use up a single slot (1 Lord) then they are taken together as the entry shows.
You cannot take one without the other.
The characters do not give up any VP's unless both are killed as they have a joint cost for points.

Common sense would suggest he cant be the general (Being a labotomised rat ogre and all)
But since when has that stopped people from hunting for loopholes to gain an advantage?

The only ambiguity is that the fluff and rules don't match perfectly...The actual rules have no ambiguity.

JD21290 wrote:
But since when has that stopped people from hunting for loopholes to gain an advantage?

This, of course, is the point of the thread in my opinion. My previous post was written to highlight what I believe to be the absurdity of this discussion.

skyth wrote:The only ambiguity is that the fluff and rules don't match perfectly...The actual rules have no ambiguity.

Out of curiosity , and rule lawyering aside i would like to get your opinion on this.

Do you feel they gave Bone Reaper LD 10 for

a) so he can be skaven general
or
b) so he can do his job as body guard properly and move around within reasonable distance to block any threat to Thanquol?

Please pick one.

It doesn't matter why he has higher leadership. I am only talking about what the rules actually say. There is no ambiguity in the rules, just complaining that people don't like what the rules actually say.

skyth wrote:It doesn't matter why he has higher leadership. I am only talking about what the rules actually say. There is no ambiguity in the rules, just complaining that people don't like what the rules actually say.

Well if you dont want to reply my question , then i have nothing else to say. And im sure others feels the same.

Quoting the wise " play the game , not the rules " especially we know how awesome GW rules are written am i right guys?

Since I am not arguing intent (Which is impossible), your question is meaningless.

skyth wrote:Since I am not arguing intent (Which is impossible), your question is meaningless.

If you think knowing the intent is impossible , then so be it.

LunaHound wrote:If you think knowing the intent is impossible , then so be it.

You can't know intent unless you are the one that is writing the rules or have directly asked those that did what their intent was. Anything else is just speculation.

JD21290 wrote:The characters do not give up any VP's unless both are killed as they have a joint cost for points.

Almost correct. Given the rules you can only get points for killing Thanquol and no points for killing Boneripper. I think this is another nail in the coffin for Boneripper not being the army General.

Negativemoney wrote:

LunaHound wrote:If you think knowing the intent is impossible , then so be it.

You can't know intent unless you are the one that is writing the rules or have directly asked those that did what their intent was. Anything else is just speculation

Not entirely true - if they then USE the rule ina published medium that also gives you intent. So, if they were to have a Bat Rep and did not have BR as general that will tell you they did not intend BR to be the general.

Possibly

The problem with the Battle Rep is unless the person that wrote the book is one of the guys participating in it and writing about it, you can't take much from that article. Also you have no idea about when that battle rep took place. If you think about it it most took place about 4 to 5 months before the book was published and the rules could have change slightly since then (Battle Reps in WDs could be play test games).

Just saying unless there is a direct quote about intent it is almost impossible know what that intent was.

The "they" in context was the rules writer, sorry if that wasnt clear.

In addition the book is finalised 4months before, as it takes that long to print, ship from china and distribute...the leads times are insane, which is why mistakes are such a pain to recitfy!

They also make mistakes all the time in Battle Reports...Like they had a 4th edition one where Chaos Space Marines were not automatically entangled when thier Rhino got destroyed.

However in this case it would still show intent of the author - if JV honestly believes BR cannot be the General, then he wont play it as such. It is only a "mistake" when there is a clear rule covering it, and here the rule is not clear.

The rule itself is absolutely clear...It's just that people don't like the rule so they try to claim it's unclear.

skyth wrote:The rule itself is absolutely clear...It's just that people don't like the rule so they try to claim it's unclear.

Your funny. Clear to you isn't clear to everyone else. Sure, as an arguement in RAW vs. RAI, go argue for 20 pages, and you can make whatever statements you like to prove it. Just don't think anyone else will actually buy into them.

But move into the real world, where a Tournament Organizer gets to "Make the Call", and you won't be seeing BR as a general. Be as absurd as you want in an interenet forum, it won't affect how the game is actually played by others.

Yes, a TO has the right to change any rule that they want to. However, by RAW, the answer is clear...The only issue is when RAW intersects with percieved RAI (Also known as 'what I want the rules to say').

Except that I won't be changing rules.)

Doubt it will come up at all, as I just don't see anyone trying to get away with it.

skyth wrote:The rule itself is absolutely clear...It's just that people don't like the rule so they try to claim it's unclear.

Actually no , the rule isnt clear.
Its why this thread exist.
"Liking" the rule or not has absolutely nothing to do with this discussion.
Im sorry that you feel like it does , but you see , im also a Skaven player.

Now lets see what units have the highest LD in skaven army. Skaven war lord and Vermin Lord , both at LD 8.
So the vermin lord cant be army general , and we are left with Warlord.

How on earth is some random robot body guard that falls apart when the master die can suddenly be a general at LD 10
you say the rule's intent is impossible to know , well i beg to differ.

Then we look at what his role is , and what he is capable of. He is capable of acting independently to an extent without the need to stay in unit
coherency to Thanquol , which means he is free to roam around and intercept enemy units. Now it makes sense why he is LD 10 .

Skyth, I won't argue that by the letter of the rules your argument has some merit. I just don't see how using the letter of the rules in this instance makes for a better game.

Skaven with a LD 10 General would be insanely hard to deal with. Period. So much so they would be not very fun to play with, much less against. But then, that is just my opinion.

Play the game any way you want to... so long as you can actually find an opponent who will agree to let you do it.

I, for one, will not.

EDIT: I take that back. Since I play skaven too, I'll do the same thing. Then our LD 10 generals cancel out and the game becomes fair again.