Rule-ism's

I'm sure you WFB players that drop by here have seen the recently released second FAQ from Games Workshop. Let me speculate and say that given GW's glacial pace at addressing rules issues, the fact they even bothered to put out a second FAQ while the Dark Elves book hasn't even gotten its own FAQ yet (more on that later), makes it a safe bet that 7th edition is here to stay at least through 2010 while all remaining army books are updated.

We know Lizards, Skaven and Beasts of Chaos are rumored this year, leaving Tomb Kings and Ogres and Bretonnians for 2010. My guess is the still viable late 6th ed books Wood Elf and Dwarf books will be the first of an 8th edition, followed by new Orc and Empire books that can address the power creep that started after their release with the High Elf and Vampire Counts books and continues full steam ahead with each successive book.( I got a look at the new Lizardmen book tuesday night, Yowza! look out they are going to be full on VC, Daemon, DE counter..let those Bloodthristers and pricey Vamp lords say hello to the Blade of Realities, among many other things)

This second FAQ that was released has some needed confirmations and clarifications in it, I want to take a moment and talk about some of my favorites and not so favorites.

Errata.. the correct wording added in several necessary places is needed confirmation of the common sense approach people have taken on those issues, it is rare discrepancies come up with some of these but personally I've played people using character more than one item with a bound spell. glad that is settled

There is alot of common sense stuff that gets brought up with movement, but when we get to
Close Combat a couple things pop out for me.

Q. Can you allocate attacks to specific enemy Rank and File models in order to force which enemy Rank and File models count as casualties (and are thus unable to fight back)?

A. Yes, however we have to warn you that zooming in to a fight to this level of detail is likely to make resolving your fights a very slow process indeed!

A somewhat silly caveat after the important answer YES. this means my Rank and File models can target other Rank and File models directly so I can now always target that pesky musician or Champion instead worrying about where my characters are placed. I've always played or (just assumed) that only Characters could target specific models, you read further down, you will see the same thing applies to unit that can fight in ranks. I'm definitely trying this in my next game, especially after taking a charge if you attacks back killing your opponents musician is key to getting that tiebreaker. (edit- nix that musician Idea, I had forgetten he works just like the standard bearer, i.e cant be individually targeted..so not as useful but still worth bringing up I guess.)

Magic Phase

Two things really pop out at me here that I have dealt with in the past.
-"Rule of burning Iron" can be cast into close combat!
-"Hunter's Spear" only causes 1 wound! not D3 like a regular bolt thrower.

Command Groups

This is an important one I am sure gets overlooked

Q. Does a unit champion count towards the 5 rank-and-file models needed to provide a Look Out Sir! roll to a character in the same unit? A. No, because when the unit is targeted by ranged attacks, they count as Characters and not as rank and file models
Here is couple that I don't like and do not make sense to me.

Q. If a character declares a lone charge out of a unit against an enemy armed with missile weapons, and the enemy elects to Stand and Shoot, whom do they target with their Stand and Shoot reaction – the character or his unit? A. They will target the character’s unit, and if the unit panics and flees, it will take the character with them.

This to me is counter intuitive as I want to shoot at the character
not the unit, your chance of killing the character is potentially better
than making the unit run. This throws and extra advantage to characters they don't need
I say if characters are going to charge solo they should take their lumps!

and

Q. Can a Wizard cast the Lore of Heavens spell, Celestial Shield upon a unit he is attached to? The spell's description states that it can be cast upon a friendly unit that is ‘visible’ to the caster. A. This may seem counter-intuitive, but the letter of the law says that the answer is ‘no’, as the Wizard does not have Line of Sight to his own unit.

Nuff Said on that one, silly.


Now back to the Dark Elves. Apparently we need that Dark Elves FAQ pronto, over at Bell of Lost Souls they posted a Dark Elves Tactica which lists various "dirty tricks". The most offensive being you can voluntarily move the crew from the Cauldron of Blood all over the battle field in order to keep them from getting killed ( you can only stop it by killing the crew) The author is claiming you can still use the Cauldrons powers even thou the crew has abandoned it, because even thou it's clearly classified as a warmachine, it somehow isn't. There are numerous examples I can find in the rulebook that prevent this. However the author (who is apparently a local tourney judge) is splitting hairs over the wording of the Cauldron and Core rules. It should be blatantly obvious to anyone with a sense of fair play what the actual intent is.

Now I have played the Dark Elves and the Cauldron a bunch at this point and no one I've played has even thought to try this. Killing the damn crew is hard enough on its own (as the Cauldron is often deployed in a forest or somewhere hard to get to) let alone with this crap.

This kind of rules parsing is what turned the the 40K tourney scene into a cesspool, and gets honest 40K players all worked up (deservedly so) about the lack of official FAQ's and is what made the Adepticon FAQ into a 92 page nightmare, I'm sorry but needing a 92 page FAQ for a tournament is just bad for business.

Anyway, I like Bell of Lost Souls alot, and I was psyched about the potential of Fantasy coverage, but if that's the kind of stuff they are going to be promoting, my enthusiasm is greatly discouraged.