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Right, so some of us on Dakka have been lucky enough to have seen the new book already, and indeed had a chance to plow through it in search of tidbits and general impression.

Thusly, I felt it now warranted a new thread for summing up and overall impressions. Not looking for anyone to agree with me, just a general, multi-poster review, which can of course be added to as others have their gander at the book.

Without further ado, onto my general impression and rating of the book.

First of all, it's 528 pages as most people know, and every single one of them is in full colour. The diagrams seem nice and clear, and the index is pretty comprehensive (couple of things I looked up were under subheadings, but still easily found). In terms of overall design, the one thing I would like to have seen was multiple bookmark ribbons, as this could prove very useful. As is the one you get is useful in itself, and the main rules have a colour coded index which you can see when the book is closed, so easy reference will probably come with familiarity of the book.

Now, onto the rules themselves. From what I've read, nice and easy to follow, and written in a very friendly manner. To me this is a good thing, but it might irritate some. As mentioned the diagrams of how to work out movement etc are nice and clear, and again in full colour (which is brilliant when it explains who can fight in a combat). Some areas have been streamlined, such as movement. Biggest difference here is that you can march relatively unhindered through all but impassable terrain, but must take a Dangerous Terrain test (identical to 40k).

Of all the unit types, Cavalry suffer the most. That is not to say they have been 'nerfed' or anything, just that the various forms of Infantry have gained serious boosts, and that means the days of a handful of Cavalry bursting through your line are more or less a thing of the past.

One of the biggest improvements for Infantry is that in order to deny ranks in a flank or rear charge, you must have at least one additional rank yourself. So sure, my Hydras got even harder (I can breathe into combat!) and mash stuff up, but unless it is supported by my own infantry, the enemy are pretty much guaranteed to be Stubborn when taking that breaktest. Add in that any unit, when deployed 10 wide, can attack in not 2 but 3 ranks (more with Spears!). Though of course the supporting attacks can only be performed to the front. Yet even then, should you hold in the combat, taking a quick leadership test allows you to re-form, bringing lots of attacks to bear against your assailant!

As for game balance, my local gamers and I have the distinct impression that the book does most of it for the various armies. Ogres for instance, are now incredibly hard on the charge! Sure, the enemy are likely to go first, but Bull Charge, fighting in Ranks (Monstrous Infantry get up to 3 attacks for supporting!) and STOMP!, they ought to be winning most combats!

In terms of scale, whilst the rules do enable far larger game than standard just now, you can still play the smaller games, as it mostly means less 'Horde' units!

Overall, very impressed. Very, very nice production, and lots to learn!

Thanks for your impressions! I (and most of the rest of us, I imagine) will not be able to add mine until tomorrow, but it's always nice to get an appetizer

You are welcome dude(s)!

Also, forgot to mention, that I suspect that portions of the book might very well be testing the waters in terms of feedback for potential expansions ala Planetstrike and Cities of Death. Should be very good overall!

Thanks for the review mate!

One small quicky question since I have 50 gobbo archers on the painting table... do they gain also extra rank of shooting if 10 wide?

Cant wait for 500pages of fullcolor goodness, hope artwork is nice.

Archers have 'Volley Fire'.

All Missile Weapons can fire in two ranks now, but Volley Fire allows half the models in further ranks to fire as well, making Gobbo Archers awesome, especially with a handful of fanatics.


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Oh, and the artwork is fantastic!

Awesome mate! Thanks again!

Word.

I might start playing Fantasy again, now.

Indeed, the one thing I've heard repeatedly about Fantasy that puts people off is the models in the Ranks being relatively redundant, beyond Static Res. Certainly no longer the case now!

Mmm...horde Spears fighting in 4 ranks! Skellingtons just got naughty!


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Oh, and yes. Ranks for Monstrous Infantry etc (including Pegasus Knights and Terradons) are 3 wide for standard, 6 to get Horde!

Quick Question, are there race specific updates in the book?

Those should be coming out in PDF form.

Personally, I don't see the advantage of Horde. Unless GW's trying to convince everyone that their units should be 40+ big (which I can't see them doing successfully with any army other than VC's using Zombies), you are never going to be able to make even so-so advantage of it unless on a 20mm base facing another army that's typically wider than normal or a 25mm base enemy (and often times those are enemy units you don't want hitting your wider frontage).

Again, going by the math, best case scenario a competent opponent can only deny you six attacking models (20mm v 25mm, they went five wide). Worst case scenario, you're missing out on sixteen attacking models (25mm v 20mm, using spears, 20mm went five wide). Not anything against you Mad Doc, but those who're talking about how Horde will be this great addition simply aren't factoring in that it's easy to counter and - even if not countered - similarly easy to make up by going deep instead (Stubborn Ld 9 / 10 when near a general > > > Extra 4-6 attacks).

EDIT: Also, I'm predicting we're going to see a lot of FAQ stuff for things like Spider Riders and Wood Elves to turn into "Ignore Dangerous Terrain" instead of "Ignore Difficult / Very Difficult Terrain caused by [x]." I'm also not liking that a unit marching through woods / a bog is going to suffer some 13% casualties just because, er... they're very allergic to trees and waterlife.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Indeed, the one thing I've heard repeatedly about Fantasy that puts people off is the models in the Ranks being relatively redundant, beyond Static Res. Certainly no longer the case now!

Mmm...horde Spears fighting in 4 ranks! Skellingtons just got naughty!


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Oh, and yes. Ranks for Monstrous Infantry etc (including Pegasus Knights and Terradons) are 3 wide for standard, 6 to get Horde!

That indeed is what put me off about Fantasy (Despite still playing it).. I often joked that fantasy players pay 35$ for 5 command models with extra wounds behind them

Minsc wrote:Personally, I don't see the advantage of Horde. Unless GW's trying to convince everyone that their units should be 40+ big (which I can't see them doing successfully with any army other than VC's using Zombies), you are never going to be able to make even so-so advantage of it unless on a 20mm base facing another army that's typically wider than normal or a 25mm base enemy (and often times those are enemy units you don't want hitting your wider frontage).

Again, going by the math, best case scenario a competent opponent can only deny you six attacking models (20mm v 25mm, they went five wide). Worst case scenario, you're missing out on sixteen attacking models (25mm v 20mm, using spears, 20mm went five wide). Not anything against you Mad Doc, but those who're talking about how Horde will be this great addition simply aren't factoring in that it's easy to counter and - even if not countered - similarly easy to make up by going deep instead (Stubborn Ld 9 / 10 when near a general > > > Extra 4-6 attacks).

EDIT: Also, I'm predicting we're going to see a lot of FAQ stuff for things like Spider Riders and Wood Elves to turn into "Ignore Dangerous Terrain" instead of "Ignore Difficult / Very Difficult Terrain caused by [x]." I'm also not liking that a unit marching through woods / a bog is going to suffer some 13% casualties just because, er... they're very allergic to trees and waterlife.

Yeah horde rule seems like a gimmick they included just for people that like to run silly wide units but not viable for any kind of strategy.

Ogres also don't really come out ahead in this edition unless they run large (over 6 strong to account for ranged casualties) units which will end up being more points than most other infantry blocks and still not as effective due to mediocre weapon skill and terrible initiative and armor saves.

Mad Dok, any chance you could tell me how much the book weighs?

Ogres have a lot going for them right now in my opinion, so I am very glad I'd recently started a new army of them.

The Horde will come in very handy for units like Gobbos and even Empire State Troops. They are cheap enough to field in massive blocks, without significantly impacting upon the rest of your army. As I said (might not have been terribly clear, apologies) Horde is more about the big games (3,000+) than standard ones. Certainly I fully intend on including a unit of 18 Bulls in my 4,000 point Ogre army, for the simple reason they should be able to truly wallop pretty much anyone and anything. 6 S6 Bullcharge, followed by 63 S4 attacks (front rank have two hand weapons, plus champion, second and third ranks contribute 18 each) followed by 18 stomp attacks (anyone who fought can stomp). Mediocre weapon skill really doesn't come into it too much at this stage, as the sheer volume of Stomp ought to carry the day in most cases.

Yeah but that one unit is almost 25% of your 4000 point force which is a huge investment . It doesn't sound like a gimmick that would work in a practical game where people can out maneuver it, shoot it or cast magic at it and it has almost no real defense. You also only get the bull charge if you go 6" so most people can counter it very easily.

So what's the deal with bigger units? Are they supposed to be like 10 wide now? If you want more ranks than the other guy, it's gonna be tough to do with units that wide, not to mention just moving & turning. And then having enough points in an average game for units of 40+ models? Seems like something you'd only be able to do with little wimpy things like goblins and skaven

Thanks for the new thread. Sounds like GW really changed a lot.

Perhaps we can get a summary of confirmed changes going?

I'll probably get a look at it tomorrow, maybe not, just because I don't like driving to my GW 15 minutes away to look at the book for a few minutes.

Ixquic....charges have extended somewhat. 2D6"+ Movement, so Ogres will have an average charge reach of 13", which is pretty collossal, and means it should be easy to carry off a Bull Charge these days. Certainly it's not quite as easy to avoid as marching straight into the Ogres charge reach, shortening it to 4".

One thing I would like clarified, and if what I'm thinking is true, would really turn horde's from a powr rule to just a consolation, is this...

When determining who can fight, do we still check to see if the model has an enemy model directly in front of them? Or do all models in the first two ranks just get to attack with no restrictions.

I'm thinking that being able to fight three deep when ten wide is really only there to mitigate the fact that half of the models on your frontage won't have an enemy model in front of them, and therefore won't get to attack.

If it is irrelevant whether or not there is an enemy model in front of you, why not just go 50 wide with extra hand weapons?

Horde doesn't seem like a power ability at all.

Well, if you are 5 wide, 7 of my guys in the front rank can fight, meaning Horde gets 21 people attacking if you base is the same size.

Plus I think we will see Horde being pretty popular, mainly due to the Army Organisation.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Those should be coming out in PDF form.

Will we be seeing them before the july release or on the release date?

Can't remember 100% skip. Sorry!

Oh yeah, and they reccomend a LOT more terrain than we're used to. The change in movement (being able to move unhindered through terrain) opens it up, and makes Gunlines a lot less viable, as the time you had to blast your opponent apart is reduced somewhat, both in times of available shots, and accuracy.

I'm still on the fence. I'm going to go to a local store for a demo game on the release day and decide then. Some things in this thread sound good to me, others less so.

What I was really hoping was that there'd be all the rules for Warhammer: Skirmish in the back of the book, updated for the new rules as an appendix.

Yeah, thx for the clarfication MDG. You were actually calling 'horde' more like it is. A slight combat buff for units that essentially cost twice as much as a standard 5 wide block. Not a reason for expensive saurus warriors or chaos warriors to sink ungodly numbers of points into a single unit, more of a bonus for units consisting of 2-6 point models.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Horde is more about the big games (3,000+) than standard ones. Certainly I fully intend on including a unit of 18 Bulls in my 4,000 point Ogre army, for the simple reason they should be able to truly wallop pretty much anyone and anything. 6 S6 Bullcharge, followed by 63 S4 attacks (front rank have two hand weapons, plus champion, second and third ranks contribute 18 each) followed by 18 stomp attacks (anyone who fought can stomp). Mediocre weapon skill really doesn't come into it too much at this stage, as the sheer volume of Stomp ought to carry the day in most cases.

So I happen to have 18 treekin, was planning on fielding them in 3 units of 6 (3x2 ranks). It would be funny to field all 18 together at 6-wide and get the horde rule and the last rank attacking, although perhaps not worth it for anything more than a fun deathstar kind of game . Tempting to try just for laughs, though!

Oh aye, and Large Targets being +1 to hit has gone. Downside? Cannons and other Artillery hit BOTH rider and mount...

1) Goblins... are not benefiting from Horde. They never have, and never will, get wounds in close combat. Even against a WS<4, T3, 5+ save model, they require some six attacks on average to get a single wound. The only people who ((EDIT: Greatly)) benefit from Horde are single-attack Elite models such as Phoenix Guard and Black Guard, who get all their usual benefits at no loss.

2) +2D6 charge is bad for Ogres, as on average it's only a 4" advantage at the best of times and a parity at the worst (See: Ogres roll 3-3, M4 rolls 4-4). For very average (each rolling 3-4), there's only a 2" advantage, which isn't too hard to make up with a Banner re-roll. Yes, Ogres still charge further (as does Cavalry), but it's barely enough to really matter. At least in WotR it's a solid 6" advantage base. Which reminds me, on the WotR scale, that might have made things much better for Cavalry: They strike before infantry.

3) At my GW at least, Horde isn't going to be popular barring the units I listed in Point 1. You just have no excuse to take it on fodder, as then two smaller-front units with comparable stats are going to charge in with likely Stubborn to aid them to boot (A 6x5 Night Goblin unit would be Stubborn until 8 casualties before they reach contact with the other NG unit, which if that (big unit) suffers just 6 casualties forces the 6x5 NG unit to lose 12 models now before neither is stubborn). Most armies are going to try Horde out for a few games, realize "I can't maneuver properly like this", then go back to typical regiment sizes.

4) Large Targets are no longer +1 to hit? I have to assume they gave some disadvantage to them. "We can see over other units. We can fire over other units. But we still get soft / hard cover from troops." All I can really think of is that they can't benefit from infantry cover, but that's not really a disadvantage as they never could last edition either. Right now, it looks like LT has no disadvantage and is basically turning into Monstrous Creature.

5) All War Machines, or just template / bouncing? I find it very odd that Cannonballs hit both, but for a ST it makes sense. Too bad a ST is only going to be causing S3 (so likely full save / 6's to wound) hit on the target.

Just a quick question, are the spell lores as per the rumors the same or were there somethings that were off?

also on the horde rule and its effectiveness. I think skaven will be the ones who will benefit most as they can buy 50 skavenslaves for 100 pts. and clanrats seem to be good as well. I'm new to fantasy so I may be wildly off but some people were saying they could be extremely effective if in range of the general.