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Hello Dakka!
I'm new to the whole WH Fantasy scene, figured I'd give the new edition a try since I had almost an army worth of Ogre minis from when I first started the hobby that I never got around to using...or building
Just a quick question for you all, definitely a N00B query:

Can you use the Common Magic Items to add equipment that a model cannot usually take?

Specifically, I want to give my Ogre Tyrant an Enchanted Shield, but a shield is not equipment he can normally select from his Army Book entry.
This isn't something I've come across until now, and I have no idea what the answer is, and I don't want to convert the mini only to find out it isn't legal (have you seen the price of Ogre characters?!?).

So, like I said, a N00B question, but one that has this particular N00B stumped.
Please don't heckle or throw rotten fruit, the sooner I get this sorted, the sooner I can start loosing games!

Thanks in advance for any help you can give guys!

Yeah, the generic magic items in the BRB are indeed available to all heroes who can take magic items. It's just that if they are also in the army book, their abilities are listed in the BRB and their cost is listed in the army book (or FAQ). This is all listed in brief at the top left of page 500.

It's basically a realization that some armies got short-changed when it came to giving out items. The stuff in the army books is usually tailored to said army in general, with the BRB being very generic.

let me get this right? so I could give a dwarf lord or rune lord a wizarding hat!?!?!?!

I know it says somewere in the BRB that they would loose there magic resistance cant remember were.
this would be funny and awsome!

Dwarves have no magic item selection, they specifically buy runes.

Minsc wrote:Dwarves have no magic item selection, they specifically buy runes.

This. They cant take any common magic items.

So that settles it for Dwarves

With my Tyrant, in his Army Book entry, he can choose to take Light/Heavy Armour, so it stands to reason that he can choose to take magic Light/Heavy Armour from the Common Magic Items, but he can't choose to take a shield in the Army Book entry (there is no option for one) but can I get around this by selecting one as part of his Common Magic Item allowance?
Do you get where I'm coming from?
It just seems like a bit of a cheat, I feel like there must be some restriction that I'm missing...
Don't get me wrong, I want to kit him out like this, I just want to be sure that I can.

Culial wrote:So that settles it for Dwarves

With my Tyrant, in his Army Book entry, he can choose to take Light/Heavy Armour, so it stands to reason that he can choose to take magic Light/Heavy Armour from the Common Magic Items, but he can't choose to take a shield in the Army Book entry (there is no option for one) but can I get around this by selecting one as part of his Common Magic Item allowance?
Do you get where I'm coming from?
It just seems like a bit of a cheat, I feel like there must be some restriction that I'm missing...
Don't get me wrong, I want to kit him out like this, I just want to be sure that I can.

Have you checked out the errata on the games workshop site for ogres to make sure? That should clear such issues up.

Ogres can take whatever. When you take magic armor it supercedes your regular stuff anyway. The names are just generic. Pretend it's a club of killing blow instead of a dinky humie sword. Pretend it's light armor of [whatever]. The Ogres in WoC are outfitted by Chaos Dwarves and they have essentially heavy armor (or even ultra heavy chaos armor).

Dwarfs specifically use runes. Not sure I know of any more exceptions than that. But they don't have a traditional magic items list. They just apply runes. Theirs are pretty much all better anyway--a 1+ dorf save costs you 25, a 2+ BRB save costs you 45.

7th edition made the distinction of having to be able to take mundane versions of armor in order to take magic versions i.e. can't take magic shield if you can't buy a regular shield.

8th edition does not make this distinction, and so you are able to take magic armor of any type provided you can wear armor to begin with(so no mages clearly). This also allows certain army BSB's to finally have a shield option, such as Empire.

I'm not certain of this. Under the magic armor entry it says: "Magical suits of armour and shields follow the same rules as mundane ones." To me, this suggests that if you can't take a mundane shield (or whatever), you can't take a magic one.

Biophysical wrote:I'm not certain of this. Under the magic armor entry it says: "Magical suits of armour and shields follow the same rules as mundane ones." To me, this suggests that if you can't take a mundane shield (or whatever), you can't take a magic one.

That's only if there is a specific rule stating you can't take that type of armor, if it just isn't offered, it's not saying you can't have a magic one. at least not anymore in the current edition.

Glad I'm not the only one having difficulty with this, makes me feel that little bit less stupid!

I've scoured the FAQ's and relevant sections of the rulebook, but no answer is forthcoming...
Any idea how to get in touch with GW for rules queries? All I can find is Order Enquiries...

let me get this right? so I could give a dwarf lord or rune lord a wizarding hat!?!?!?!

I had a similar idea for a Butcher, shake things up a bit by giving my army access to the Winds rather than just Gut Magic.
Plus it's be cool to model a Rincewind style "Wizzard" hat on a big sweaty Ogre!

Ogre Tyrants can take anything from the common magic item list(except for Arcane items)

Butchers and SMs can't purchase magic armor, but everything else is fine.


Remember that only a Slaughter master can take the Wizarding hat as it is over the butchers magic item limit. you might want to be careful about doing this though as it could potentially drop his Wizard level by 2.