8th Edition Review

[Norseman]

I am going to say this first.

I am NOT a GW fanboy (like on some sites)and I am usually extremely critical of the BS and poor moves they make.

However, I am completely blown away at the quality of 8th Ed rules, that they have just put out. Also the quality and clarity of the writing. There are no glaring holes in the rules. Most things are thought out well. Well explained and then for clarity a drawing just to make things clear. I actually think there is a lot less rules than 7th. Everything is greatly simplified, but not at the expense of fun, tactics, or derived complexity.

I may be a little pissed about the price tag. They REALLY did not need 500+ pages. There are 150 pages of rule total. Maybe another 50 pages of good content but another 300 pages that really didn't need to be there. It is beautiful stuff nice fluff, but mostly recycled. Some of the dioramas are extremely impressive. The hobby pages are nice, but not really that impressive, a better place would have been White Dwarf.

Lets get to the meat the changes. That I liked.

My first thoughts were utter disbelief and rage when i heard they were taking out guess ranges and that they were making charge ranges M+2d6. However when I have actually played it, it isn't that bad. It actually adds a little bit of excitement, it changes the perspective of the gamer a little. It makes you the player a general rather than say a god, (pardon the illustration) It takes the decision and the knowing, away from you, the player, and kind of lets your troops make the decision. I know it sounds kind of funny, and you may be asking yourself how can little plastic men make decisions? The dice rolls for charging simulate the troops being tired or fired up, Scared of the enemy or being in disarray. Something a general couldn't really be in control of. It makes it a little more random but as a general you can not be CERTAIN your troops are going to deliver. Frankly I like it. It adds a little bit of luck to it but it adds excitement and if your really NEED the charge you will have to plan for it.

All in all the charge is not as important as it used to be anyways (+1 to combat rez). HtH is completely changed Striking order is governed by INIT stat now. Which makes sense. Why would fast dark elves be surprised by slow dwarves just because they charged. It does change things a lot.
Also Combat res has changed.
+1 for Flank which can stack for each flank.
+2 for Rear
+1 for rank to a max of +3(AFTER combat)
+1 Std (doesnt have to be in fighting rank)
+1 BSB (doesnt have to be in fighting rank)
+1 Charge
+1 High ground
(No outnumber)

You will be seeing a ton of Hoards. The rule is amazing.
If you are 10 files wide you strike in an extra rank. This will not work for a lot of units but some it is amazing.
Taking into consideration that you get to strike in 2 ranks anyways(limited to 1 attack for second rank) the 3rd rank and 4th in some cases (spears) really makes big blocks advantageous.

One sleeper that I haven't seen discussed on a lot of sights is the Stomp and Thunderstomp special rules. Monstrous Infantry and M.Cav get a ASL AUTO HIT attack at the end of combat and Monsters get 1d6 AUTO HIT attacks at their strength. This is INSANE. The Stomp is nice and adds flavor, but the THUNDERSTOMP is INSANE. It does make sense and I can see why they did it. It has single handily brought (Sexy) Dragons and Monstrous mounts back. My opponent was using a Bloodthirster and let me tell you, He will be using one until 9th Ed. Monsters are back. Hydra, Greater Deamons, Abominations, and Dragons WILL be gracing the tables of WFB a lot more than they were in 7th.

Other nice changes are in Artillery. If panicked they hide under the gun they do not run away. (Cant shoot next turn). If assaults can only be engaged by limited models. If "broken" the gun is destroyed. Shooting can only target the gun must wound versus the guns toughness.

Magic is proabably the biggest change. My thoughts are mixed. I played a few magic heavy armies. I feel the spells are a little nastier, and miscasts are harder to get. Now a miscast only occurs when you get a irristable force. Miscasts are terribly bad. Lets just say the best thing that can happen is the your mage loses 1d3 levels. They go from bad to worse, stack a STR 10 small template on your wizard then a Str 6 hit an all friendly mages. Very nasty. They have removed the lvl +1 Dice restriction, however if you do not make the roll to cast the spell or you dice total is less than 3 you lose concentration and can not cast any more spells for that phase.

The one thing I totally hate, because it hoops my empire army is that priest spells cost dice to cast now as do bound items. However if they do not cast them because of dice they do not lose concentration.

I think spells are going to be hard to get off this edition. dice are generated by rolling 2d6 That is the total casting dice. the high d6 is the amount of dispel.

One first in a long time change, is the change to the wound table. There are no more "-" marks they have been changed to 6s. This is huge! This has made it possible for standard bow shooting to kill anything on the battlefield. Personally I think shooting was underpowered, and it needed this for balance.

No more Large target bonuses for shooting. A further bonus for monsters.

Has anyone else played?

What are your thoughts?

[starslayer]

I play Dwarves. Can you tell me any Dwarf specific rules? Do they get less charge/flee/pursue/ How about Dispel dice? Runesmiths/RuneLords?

[Norseman]

Off the top of my head.

All standard rules from the army book stand. So the minus 1 inch for charging and fleeing will stand. However there is a rulebook special rule for +2 dispel dice for dwarf players.(Edit: +2 to dispel rolls not +2 Dice)

Point of interest:War machines get to use the best ballistic skill in the crew.

There will be a big errata for most army books on release date, I hear so other special stuff will be dealt with then. There are a lot of special rules that will have to be assigned to units.

Here are a few of the unassigned special rules i noted. Some are pretty easy to pick out where they are going, but a few are interesting but hard to place.
ie:
Loremaster - Knowing all spells in a certain college
Devastating charge - +1 attack on charge
Hover - Flyer Special rules but may not march
Heroic Killing Blow - Killing Blow but any base size
Sea creature - Move in Impassible Water Feature May not march when not in Water
Sniper: -1 To Hit but may pick target
Strider - No Dangerous Terrain Test on specific terrain type
SwiftStride - Roll 3d6 take 2 highest for Charge, Flee, & Pursue
Volley Fire - half Models in 3rd & 4th ranks may fire
Vanguard - After deployment may make 12" move for free, not within 12" of enemy.

[starslayer]

Thanks!
Some Dwarf players are saying Runesmiths/Runelords arent mentioned as adding any Dispel dice in the book. I guess it will be covered in the Erratta.

[reegsk]

Norse, nice roundup! As far as the unassigned special rules, I know that Volley Fire is for Short Bows, Bows and Longbows, but nothing else mentioned in the book (I would imagine Glade Guard Bows will be included). Loremaster will be for anyone who has the ability to know an entire lore (such as the VC Bloodline power Forbidden Knowledge, or something like Fateweaver). Hover will be for Bat Swarms and Tzeentch Discs, things that use the Flying special rule but can't fly 20". The only thing I can think of that would use Sniper is the Hochland Long Rifle. Vanguard will be, most likely, for Fast Cav. And Swiftstride will no doubt be for almost everything with a movement of six or higher, except maybe heavy cav?

One big change to movement is how Flying works now. Flying is a 10" movement that ignores all terrain (but I believe you still cannot take off or land in terrain, or have to take a dangerous terrain test). You can March and go 20", but now flyers can be march-blocked. Admittedly, you can ignore march blocking with a Ld test, but that's still pretty cool. And now flyers charge 10 + 2d6, perhaps with Swiftstride, which means that, on average, their charge will be 17".

[Norseman]

Sorry my reply was worded wrong. I went back to check if Runesmiths were mentioned.

The Rule is +2 to all dispel rolls attempted, not +2 extra actual dice.

I believe that runesmiths will be able to channel dispel dice, which all wizards can do to both casting and dispel dice. Each wizard gets another dice if they roll a 6 on the channeling roll. So it looks like runesmiths will be able to add a few more dice, but it is not said for sure.

[Asif Chaudhry]

Lets get to the meat the changes. That I liked.

My first thoughts were utter disbelief and rage when i heard they were taking out guess ranges and that they were making charge ranges M+2d6. However when I have actually played it, it isn't that bad. It actually adds a little bit of excitement, it changes the perspective of the gamer a little. It makes you the player a general rather than say a god, (pardon the illustration) It takes the decision and the knowing, away from you, the player, and kind of lets your troops make the decision. I know it sounds kind of funny, and you may be asking yourself how can little plastic men make decisions? The dice rolls for charging simulate the troops being tired or fired up, Scared of the enemy or being in disarray. Something a general couldn't really be in control of. It makes it a little more random but as a general you can not be CERTAIN your troops are going to deliver. Frankly I like it. It adds a little bit of luck to it but it adds excitement and if your really NEED the charge you will have to plan for it.

Are charge ranges M+2d6 OR M + (the highest single roll out of 2d6). Can M4 foot troops really charge 16" now? Or is it a max of 10"?

All in all the charge is not as important as it used to be anyways (+1 to combat rez). HtH is completely changed Striking order is governed by INIT stat now. Which makes sense. Why would fast dark elves be surprised by slow dwarves just because they charged. It does change things a lot.

Why would dwarves hit first? Because they have the impetus of running full tilt at the enemy maybe? Kinda blows to be low init troops - you weathered all kinds of shooty firepower to get close to the enemy, charge in, and then they are hacking you up first?

So foot troops can shoot you up, then "stand and shoot" as a charge reaction, and then hack you up, before you ever get to do anything?

Yeah - doesn't sound that great to me Norse.

Also Combat res has changed.
+1 for Flank which can stack for each flank.
+2 for Rear
+1 for rank (AFTER combat)
+1 Std (doesnt have to be in fighting rank)
+1 BSB (doesnt have to be in fighting rank)
+1 Charge
+1 High ground
(No outnumber)

Is it still +1 per rank, upto a max of +3? Or +1 max?, or + however many ranks you have after combat res? And no outnumbering? Sounds like Hero Hammer is coming back in a big way - until you get to the shooting rules.

You will be seeing a ton of Hoards. The rule is amazing.

Well, at $75 for just the rule, there should be hoards of gold in them! Oh... you meant "hordes". Never mind.

If you are 10 files wide you strike in an extra rank. This will not work for a lot of units but some it is amazing.
Taking into consideration that you get to strike in 2 ranks anyways(limited to 1 attack for second rank) the 3rd rank and 4th in some cases (spears) really makes big blocks advantageous.

So, el cheapo goblins and skaven slaves, who are already shooting a bajillion bows and slings at you, are now effectively farther away, due to uncertain charge ranges, get to stand and shoot, get to attack first if you have a low Initiative, and NOW fight with more models?

Hmmmm....yeah, not seeing the "happy happy, joy joy" that you appear to be.

One sleeper that I haven't seen discussed on a lot of sights is the Stomp and Thunderstomp special rules. Monstrous Infantry and M.Cav get a ASL AUTO HIT attack at the end of combat and Monsters get 1d6 AUTO HIT attacks at their strength. This is INSANE. The Stomp is nice and adds flavor, but the THUNDERSTOMP is INSANE. It does make sense and I can see why they did it. It has single handily brought (Sexy) Dragons and Monstrous mounts back. My opponent was using a Bloodthirster and let me tell you, He will be using one until 9th Ed. Monsters are back. Hydra, Greater Deamons, Abominations, and Dragons WILL be gracing the tables of WFB a lot more than they were in 7th.

That assumes said big guys are still around after being shot to hell by a bajillion bows. Oh well - at least the high toughness ones can just shrug off bows and other massed light fire.

Oh.....wait.....

Other nice changes are in Artillery. If panicked they hide under the gun they do not run away. (Cant shoot next turn). If assaults can only be engaged by limited models. If "broken" the gun is destroyed. Shooting can only target the gun must wound versus the guns toughness.

Magic is proabably the biggest change. My thoughts are mixed. I played a few magic heavy armies. I feel the spells are a little nastier, and miscasts are harder to get. Now a miscast only occurs when you get a irristable force. Miscasts are terribly bad. Lets just say the best thing that can happen is the your mage loses 1d3 levels. They go from bad to worse, stack a STR 10 small template on your wizard then a Str 6 hit an all friendly mages. Very nasty. They have removed the lvl +1 Dice restriction, however if you do not make the roll to cast the spell or you dice total is less than 3 you lose concentration and can not cast any more spells for that phase.

The one thing I totally hate, because it hoops my empire army is that priest spells cost dice to cast now as do bound items. However if they do not cast them because of dice they do not lose concentration.

I think spells are going to be hard to get off this edition. dice are generated by rolling 2d6 That is the total casting dice. the high d6 is the amount of dispel.

So - Magic is tougher to use and get off, and those armies (like WoC) that don't have access to shooting troops and rely on magic to "magic missile" opposing artillery crews, can no longer hit the crew, only the Toughness 7 war machine with their strength 3 or 4 magic missiles?

Got it......

One first in a long time change, is the change to the wound table. There are no more "-" marks they have been changed to 6s. This is huge! This has made it possible for standard bow shooting to kill anything on the battlefield. Personally I think shooting was underpowered, and it needed this for balance.

Oh goody! So all the elf/empire/dwarf armies will become even MORE shooty, because shooting can cure ALL woes now! Yay!

No more Large target bonuses for shooting. A further bonus for monsters.

So now, when 60 bows fire at my dragon at BS 3, instead of having 40 hit, and NONE wound because they couldn't touch my monster's high toughness, they'll have only 30 hit, but they can roll 6's to wound, resulting in 5 hits on average, that I now have to save against with (lets say a 3+ scaly skin save), resulting in 1 to 2 wounds, before I even get to do anything? And before the cannon balls and bolt throwers have fired?

Yay!

Has anyone else played?

What are your thoughts?

Honestly, I haven't played or seen the rules, but frankly, your post is giving me the impression that I should be busting out my digital camera and start taking pictures of my WoC and DoC, because 8th edition is officially the "Screw HtH/tough guy armies! We've sold enough Chaos and Ogre minis - now we want to sell lots of Empire, Dwarves, and Elves minis! And huge gobs of skaven and goblins too!"

And this is all without you mentioning that 8th ed (is rumored to have) nerfed how Fear and Terror work as well.

(*sigh*)

[mrrshann618]

Not having played fantasy since about 4th/5th edition I do have to say one thing.
I'm glad things are based on initiaive. why? simply becuase the faster troops would be more likely to set themselves to resist a charge due to natural reaction time. On the other hand if this is the case I personally think units with Spears should have at least a first rank/first strike on the defensive due to their reach. No army has ever charged a block of spearmen and not taken casualties, the whole point of spears is to hit the guy with the sword before he can hit you.

Many of the chages are making me think about getting back into the game simply becuase initially it sounded like a step away from hero hammer and a rebalancing of the uber armies vs everyone else. Sounds like they are trying to get a chance to the non-big 3 armies on the block.

Shooting has always been dangerous. Historically a unit of English bowmen could devistate an opposing army, I don't see the problem with getting things more in line with how powerful shooting really is. Ancient armor never really protected against bows, and shields were only mediocre at best. I see this a a reason why armies now need to have fast cavalry and other elements on the field other than hammer units. Sounds to me more like GW is trying to shake up army coposition a bit, and in the long run sell different models.
Speaking of army comp, I heard that in the MRB there is now a % ratio that needs to be followed, such as only as much as 25% of your points can be spent in heros/lords while a minimum of 25% has to be spent in core. (I'm not sure of the actual ratio I have no FLGS near me to take a first hand look at the new rules)

[reegsk]

AC, it's nowhere near as much doom and gloom as you're thinking. Before I had a chance to look at the rules myself, I thought the same way. But after reading the rulebook and playing the game, it's a lot better than it looks at first. First off, magic isn't harder to cast, it's just more limited. I mean, can anyone deny that a 30+ power die Tzeentch Daemon list was completely ridiculous? Good casters are still good at casting, in fact better now. You get a bonus to your casting roll equal to your wizard level, meaning that a level 4 gets +4 to cast. Higher-level wizards still know more spells. And when you see what spells can do, you'll want to have at least a caster or two. To give you an idea, Fireball, the lowest spell in the Lore of Fire, does D6 S4 at 24" range. Not bad. Or, you can increase the power (and casting cost), to do 2d6 S4 hits at 36". Or you can go for 3d6 S4 hits at 48". Magic is interesting and potentially a lot more devastating now, but the price of miscasting is high.

And WoC will be one of the nastiest armies in HtH now. Take a unit of fifteen Chaos Warriors with Halberds. Get them into close combat, and you have 15 attacks at S4, I5, meaning that you'll strike first if fighting Dwarfs, Lizardmen, humans, Vampire Counts, Tomb Kings and some Daemons, whether you charge or not. Terrain no longer slows you down, so your warriors can march through a forest, gain soft cover, and get into the enemy's face all the faster. There are no partial hits from templates any more, true, but warmachines allow armor saves now. So if your T4, 4+ armor save chaos warriors get hit with a now S3 stone thrower, sure there will be a LOT of hits, but they'll wound on a 5+ and you'll get your 4+ armor save.

Steadfast and Horde are great, and will really help crap units like goblins and slaves. But the thought of a unit of fifty guys getting charged by five mounted soldiers, losing only a handful of guys and fleeing is kind of ridiculous. And it doesn't make them better fighters, per se. Sure, slaves with spears can fight in four ranks, but they're still crap WS and normal S, and your guys fight in multiple ranks too. Hellcannons will be great for taking out those nice, juicy units that are ten wide, five deep.

As to your questions, charge range is M + 2d6. If you fail, you go a distance equal to the highest die.

It's +1 per rank, to a max of +3. And now, in order to take away enemy rank bonuses, you must charge in the flank/rear with a unit that has a rank bonus. So skirmishers still cannot take away ranks.

Herohammer is kind of back, but kind of not. You can spend 25% of your total points on Lords, and another 25% on heroes. But now, if you have more ranks than your opponent, you count as Steadfast, which is basically stubborn. So having a really powerful hero is great. . .until he charges into a unit of fifty night gobbos and spends the next six rounds of combat only killing thirty of them and not even coming close to earning his points back.

Trust me, read the rulebook and play a few games before you come to a final judgement. And try to do it with an open mind. This is the best thing to happen to warhammer since I started, seven years ago. 7th ed was HORRIBLE!

Ninja'd -- Mrrshann, it's Max 25% Lords, max 25% Heroes, min 25% core, max 50% special, max 25% rare. You cannot take more than 3 of the same Special choice, or 2 of the same rare choice, but there are no slot restrictions any more. If you are playing 3,000+ points, it counts as a Grand Army, so you can take 6 of the same special, and 4 of the same rare.

[starslayer]

Wow! Wont a unit of Goblin archers be very good for the points? You'll get all those missile attacks, stand/shoot, steadfast & the "horde" rule!

[jmsincla]

Trust me, read the rulebook and play a few games before you come to a final judgement. And try to do it with an open mind. This is the best thing to happen to warhammer since I started, seven years ago. 7th ed was HORRIBLE!

I couldn't agree more with this statement. I quit playing 7th edition last fall because it was so boring. I was able to get 3 games of 8th edition in this weekend and loved it. From my limited experience, 8th edition is a breath of fresh air from 7th.

[Norseman]

Asif,

Try it before you freek out. I was freeking out myself after I JUST read it. I was thinking this is broken, and this is too nerfed. I was all upset at a lot of things. When you add it all up i think it is a net gain. The game IS better.

Herohammer is not back. I think we will be seeing a lot more glory and centerpiece units, but they by themselves are not able to beat blocks of infantry.

I think shooting has gotten the biggest bump in power, which will Totally benefit dwarves. (pointed at Asif)

Thanks to Reegsk for clarifying a few points I missed.

[starslayer]

Im gonna give it a shot. Its easy to make snap judgements & theorize. I want to see how it really PLAYS!

[reegsk]

SS -- Yes. . .yes they will. The way Volley Fire works, the whole front rank fires, and the whole second rank, and then half of each rank behind the second. You cannot VF if you move, but, say you have forty gobbos with bows, that's thirty shots. You cannot VF as a stand-and-shoot, but you can fire with the front two ranks, and then fight with three ranks in combat. Definitely try it out. . .it plays very nicely.

NM -- No sweat. Every time I post about 8th, I always ask the readers to clarify anything I missed.

[Norseman]

I was thinking about another difference in 8th. The horde rule is making some units so hard they will be almost unbeatable. I am thinking about HE Spearmen in a block of 50.
ASF
High Int
Fight in 5 ranks that's 50 attacks before most strike.

What can you do?

Flank attack?
But what if it well defended and you cant?
Maybe a tag team with another unit?
May still not be enough.
Shoot it?
Maybe but what if you have not shooting?

It is units like this that I think are going to change the game so much that it will require a paradigm shift. Well something in my mind that is a paradigm shift anyways. I have never fielded what i would classify as a Kamikaze unit. I field baiting units, i field bog down units, but I have never fielded a unit to just kill as much stuff in an enemy unit then die, weakening it hopefully enough to allow another unit to deal with it later.

I am thinking about 7-14 man units of HE Swordmasters. They are not going to be able to handle most units by themselves, but they are going to be able to do a lot of damage before they die though.
Other ideas
Unit of 7 Khorne Chaos Warriors.
7 Dryads
Units with high enough INIT to get their attacks but are to costly to field en mass, or just do not have the staying power to survive against 40-50 or so counter attacks.

What are your thoughts?