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I was wondering what the general consensus is on the Autarch's Master Strategist ability is.

If I have two autarchs in my army, then does each one add 1 to reserve die rolls?

Ezz

That is a good question.

I'd say RAW yes the ability stacks.

FWIW, the Enhance warlock power mentions that it is not cumulative on the opposite page.

Not being a regular to YMDC, I have to ask: FWIW? "For what it's worth," I'm guessing?

Enhance is a specific case where it states in the rules that it does not apply. Master strategist is a bit more interesting, since the first effect of the ability (setting strategy rating) specfically applies if you have at least one Autarch in your army. It's the rest of the entry that provokes a very important question.

I think we can all agree that, while rubber-band hawks may not be game unbalancing, the other implication for escalation style games could be a pretty big deal. Whenever you have two forces that have a comparable amount of forces in reserve, whomever brings the firepower to bear first is often much better off. In this case the Eldar player strictly fails on 1's. I guess the price you pay would be not having a Farseer in the list. Still, I have enough experience with Tau Commander battlesuits to know that mobile BS5 firepower and IC status can be a real pain. Maybe it's worth the loss.

Ezz

Yes, for what it's worth.

I looked closely at the language of the rule and I don't think it can be determined semantically or gramatically one way or the other. The rule doesn't give any information about either the power stacking or the power not stacking.

So unless there's a general rule that says either "things stack" or "things don't stack," then it can't be determined from the rules whether or not they stack. To come to either conclusion you have to make a circular argument by assuming that your conclusion is true.

Or try to derive an implication by looking at it in context. As noted, the other effect of the ability is specifically worded to take into account the possibility of multiple Autarchs. And Enhance (on the opposite page) has a specific prohibition against stacking. In context with those two rules, it looks to me that the +1 should stack. Also within the greater context of the rules, in which multiple enhancements often do add together (like Furious Charge and Daemonic Strength).

It's not 100% conclusive, but it looks pretty good to me.