Games Workshop recently delved into the internet community, that vast bastion of good manners, courtesy and reasoned arguments, to attempt to answer some of the questions that had been troubling 40k players for many years. Come with me, as we gaze into the abyss to see what was truly on the mind of the 40k gamer. For more reviews, analyses and battle reports, check out the Tactics Corner.
These army reviews are intended as tongue in cheek looks at certain aspects of the game. No digs at any particular players or playstyles are intended, it’s all just a bit of fun. In particular, this edition is not intended to disparage the recent direction of Games Workshop in engaging with the community, this is simply to make fun of what I saw as some of the sillier aspects of the recent FAQ.
Warhammer 40,000 Rulebook Final FAQ (Final Edition, Finally released, you can all Finally shut up about it!)
A good few months ago now, we asked you for your questions on the Warhammer 40,000 rules to help our team with the new FAQ. Literally thousands of you responded, fortunately, only half the respondents directly insulted our mothers. Only 80% of the questions were ones that could be easily answered by simply glancing at the Rulebook. After sorting through them, we posted a draft up on the Warhammer 40,000 Facebook page, and again asked for your thoughts (before they were ratified as the word of the Emperor), and once more we gathered all your feedback. This gave you many, many months to bitch and moan about how we had nerf’ed your favourite army and to plead with us to change everything back.
FAQs
Q: What does ‘base contact’ or ‘base-to-base contact mean?
A: It means when the bases contact. An element of common sense is required here, but after reading the facebook comments and several forums, we realise this is asking a bit much.
Q: Can Space Marines really summon Daemons? And even summon Daemons on a roll of 2+ using the Librarius Conclave’s Empyric Channeling?
A: Yes, to both questions. We did like how you phrased this as a question when it is really an attempt to get us to change the rules. It doesn’t make too much sense from a background perspective, but those Daemon kits aren’t going to sell themselves!
Q: How many dice does a Mastery Level 2 Librarian joined with a Mastery Level 1 Grey Knight Strike Squad generate for their Warp Charge pool?
A: Three. If we have to go back and teach you basic math, this is going to be a very long FAQ.
Q: Warhammer 40,000: The Rules states that a model gets ‘the advantage of always using the best available save’. Does that mean we have to use the numerically lowest save, or do we have the option of using any save we have?
A: The controlling player chooses which save is best. Were you seriously forcing your opponent to use worse saves based on your definition of best?!? We need to seriously rethink that common sense thing.
Q: Do plasma cannons and other Gets Hot Blast weapons benefit from rules that allow them to re-roll To Hit rolls of 1? For example, a Clan Raukaan character wearing the Tempered Helm nominates a unit of friendly Devastators to re-roll To Hit rolls of 1 in this Shooting phase. These Devastators are all equipped with plasma cannons. Do they get to re-roll the Gets Hot roll if it comes up as 1?
A: Yes, OK, yes. Enough, we’ll allow it. Please stop sending us emails about this!
Q: If you fire an Ordnance weapon from a Stationary vehicle, are all other shots Snap Shots? What about when moving? How is this altered if the vehicle is a Heavy Tank (e.g. a Leman Russ Demolisher with plasma cannon sponsons), or Fast, or a Flyer (e.g. when firing hellstrike missiles, does firing the first missile mean that the second is fired as a Snap Shot)?
A: No, you cannot get around the snap fire rule just by choosing to fire the Ordnance weapon last. Why would you possibly fire it first in that case? This is as bad as the whole “end of the psychic phase” mess for the Librarius Conclave.
Also, sorry IG players, your Leman Russes still suck!
Q: The rules state that if a vehicle fires an Ordnance weapon, all other weapons must be fired as Snap Shots – does the firing order matter?
A: Nope, sorry, you don’t get around this just by asking the question differently.
Q: How does a unit consisting of a mix of Cavalry, Bike, Jump Pack and Infantry models move, Run, Turbo-boost and charge? Do they all use their respective rules while maintaining squad coherency?
A: Yes. Models move individually, so in the Movement phase each model in this unit can move up to their maximum movement allowance so long as the unit is in unit coherency at the end of the move. If the unit elects to Run, no models in the unit may shoot. The unit doesn’t benefit from the Cavalry model’s Fleet rule, as that only applies if every model in the unit has the Fleet rule. If the unit Runs, the Bike may Turbo-boost, but must finish its move in unit coherency. When charging, the Jump model may use its jump pack (if it did not do so in the Movement phase) to re-roll the charge distance – however that model, and only that model, must use the new distance rolled. No more throwing that single Jump Pack into your Deathstar and getting extra charge distance for everyone!
Q: Do units disembarking from a Deep Striking Transport also count as entering play via Deep Strike?
A: Yes. Again, seriously?!?
Q: Can a Fortification Scout?
A: Why would you even……..
Q: Can I have an Unbound army comprising nothing but buildings?
A: No. Based on the asking of this question, we can surmise that (a) You have no friends, (b) You have no soul and, (c) You are unfamiliar with the human concept of ‘fun’. Therefore, even if we answered yes, we doubt you would be able to get a game with such an army.
Q: Can you clarify the term ‘deploy’?
A: We could, but we’d rather not.
Q: Do Feel No Pain saves stack? For example if a Painboy (5+) took a cybork body (6+), does it have a 4+ Feel No Pain save, or do you just use the best one?
A: No, they don’t stack. Who do you think you are, Space Marines? Talk to use when your army starts to shift as many units as them, Ork boy.
Q: Can a model’s Feel No Pain roll ever reach 1+, and if it can, is 1 still a fail?
A: No, you cannot have an unkillable character. You’re going to have to settle for “practically unkillable” like everybody else.
Q: Are passengers in Jinking Transports forced to fire Snap Shots?
A: No. We were going to go the other way on this one, but when we figured out it would also affect good armies, such as Eldar and Necrons, and not just Dark Eldar players, we decided against it.
Q: Using grenades in the Assault phase. Can every model replace their close combat attacks with a single grenade attack or just one model in the unit? Like in the Shooting phase e.g. a unit of 5 Tau Pathfinders charge a Knight. Do 5 Pathfinders make close combat haywire grenade attacks?
A: Only one model from the unit can attack with a grenade in the Assault phase. Per Warhammer 40,000: The Rules, ‘Only one grenade (of any type) can be thrown by a unit per phase’. What do you mean your Ork Tanksbustas and Astra Militarum Veterans can’t survive more than a single round of combat against an Imperial Knight? You must not be using them right.
We don’t care if the 40k universe is a hellhole where every day is unending misery. This is a British game and you will queue to use your Meltabombs one at a time.
Q: Can a Detachment include Core, Command and Auxiliary Detachment choices from other publications? For example, can a Gladius Detachment (Codex: Space Marines) include Core, Command and Auxiliary Formations from War Zone Damocles: Kauyon if the White Scars or Raven Guard are chosen for your Chapter Tactics?
A: No, just no. Seriously, are Space Marines not good enough already for you? What do you want? Free weapons upgrades on top of all your free transports?
Q: Can I use Apocalypse Formations in non-Apocalypse games?
A: Sure, why not, 7th edition is basically apocalypse-lite anyway.
So, there you have it. See you in other 20 years for the next FAQ update!
And as always, Frontline Gaming sells Games Workshop product at up to 25% off of retail, every day!
Frontline Gaming will buy your used models for cash or store credit!
Always a great read!
Cheers!
“We don’t care if the 40k universe is a hellhole where every day is unending misery. This is a British game and you will queue to use your Meltabombs one at a time.”
Bravo good sir. Bravo.
The British may not have invented queuing (we probably did, though), but we have spent centuries perfecting the art.
I dunno, when it comes to waiting in lines for things you’re hard-pressed to beat the Russians.
Epic lol
Actually, there are some fairly reasonable applications of the “best available save” rule that I had encountered in previous games.
In the old Dark Eldar with the 2++ invul that was lost forever if you failed it, I would sometimes want to use my crappy armour save if I was faced with a stray bolter shot rather than get unlucky and lose my invul for the rest of the game. Or there were some other scenarios where a save may have been “worse” from a percentage standpoint but there was some secondary rule that came with the save that I liked better. I could see how that was a serious question.
Yeah, the big issue came with the Ravenwing release, where opponents were trying to force people to use the 3+ armour save and not allow them to Jink to get the 4+ re-rollable, arguing that the re-roll didn’t count.
Yeah, that one I rule to be “that guy.” You’re really going to try to cheese your opponent out of the better statistical save just because the first roll is worse? Elementary math tells you a 4+ re-rollable at 75% is better than a 3+ at 67%.
The question is, why does the rule exist at all if it functionally just says “use whichever save you want even if it’s worse.”
I get that people want to use the Jink save when it is statistically better even if it is numerically worse, but it also allows things like choosing to use your armor save against a weapon when your cover save is better, because you want the models to die.
I find it funny that you can’t scout a fortification since this is the same game that introduced the concept of the drop bastion in the original planets trike rules.
Clearly fortifications are a crafty bunch.
Also I’m all for a pure fortification army. I’ll just garrison all your buildings and blow up the few that I can’t and win. Sounds like such an exciting game.
Planetstrike had a lot of bad ideas…. drop bastions was one of them.
Also, I wouldn’t even blow up the fortifications. I would just sit on the objectives and make the game take the full 5-7 turns until I won.
My army: 22 Vengeance Weapon Batteries covering my deployment zone like a blanket.
Come at me, broseph.
lol
I heard Void Shield Generators were really good in the competitive meta, so I brought an army consisting entirely of VSGs and TLD-Battery battle boards from Forge World. I will now declare that my fortifications are dedicated to Tzeentch and roll from the Warlord Trait table in Wrath of Magnus to make one of my VSGs a ML1 Psyker. It has scout, but I will deploy via outflank.
Idea for Dark Heresy campaign: psychic daemon-possessed sentient void shield generator…
I laughed, the sgt laughed, the void shield laughed.
Here’s a way to give the title of this article more humor: call it the Final FAQ Super Special Edition Director’s Cut! I swear, this is not a George Lucas edit!
I’ll release the director’s cut in 6 months time and charge twice the price!
Don’t forget to include the edit where the player whose turn it isn’t shoots first! 🙂