‘Warhammer: The Old World’- Everything You Need To Know About The July FAQ

There is a new FAQ out for Warhammer: The Old World, here is what you need to know.

Last week, along with Dwarf pre-orders, we got a new FAQ for the Old World. On the one hand, it’s maybe not amazing that the game has needed three rounds of FAQs to the core rules (and there are still plenty of questions we need answered). On the other hand, that it’s gotten so many FAQs is a sign of GW’s commitment to the game and improving it. Some games go years without FAQs. As a result, I think we can say that the rapid-fire FAQs for Old World are a good sign. This coming along with the fourth, of nine, Arcane Journals is showing strong support for the game. So today, let’s take a look at the most important changes in the FAQ.

Fly And Movement

First up we have a couple of interrelated things. The Fly rule was errata’ed to read as above. This clarifies that Fly can be used whenever the a model with the rule moves. It also confirms that the fly movement characteristic is its own thing, and ties off any loop holes of it getting buffed with movement buffs.

This is extra interesting when combined with the FAQ on what counts as a move. Basically, anything that would cause a unit of model to change position, with a few noted exceptions, is a move.  This doesn’t merely mean moving in the movement phase but includes FBIGO, giving ground, following up, countercharges, and anything else that moves a model. Given the change to Fly this means you can use your fly movement/ability to move over things for all of these. It also means rules like Drilled can be triggered a lot.

Wizardly Doings

Next up we’ve got a few FAQ’s dealing with wizards and magic. We get confirmation that a wizard can cast as many magic missiles/vortexes a phase as they know. While this was what most people thought, it’s good to see it confirmed. In addition, GW clarified that you cannot cast a conveyance on a turn you charge. Also Plague of Rust does not affect Ward/Regen saves, an obvious one, but it still needed a RAW clarification. On top of all that, they clarified that no, Arcane Familiar does not increase the number of spells you know. All in all, a good set of answers.

Chariots, Mounts And the Mess of Things

You may recall that the last FAQ kind of broke the game a little bit. This was due to a ruling that split profile models, i.e. chariots and mounted models, consisted of several independent models sharing the same base. Due to all parts of a split profile model sharing special rules this mean that something like a chariot could have 5 or model “models” duplicated a special rule, like Impact Hits. This was obviously not RAI and not how anyone played, but was RAW.

Luckily after this was brought up GW has FAQ’d that Impact Hits and Stomp attacks are only done by a mount, unless the rider has their own rule, in which case they are only done by them. While this is the obvious and correct ruling, it’s sad that it’s such a limited change. It still doesn’t fix other rule duplication, such as how many screams a Coven Throne gets.

Along with this, the FAQ also rules that impact hits can only be done against a unit you moved into base contact with. This includes in a challenge and if for some reason, the challenged model isn’t eligible to be targeted with the impact hits they can be directed against another unit. I don’t like this ruling. While the targeting part makes in-game sense it’s a bit clunky. However the worst part is allowing a chariot in a challenge to do impact hits outside of it. In every other situation, they’ve ruled that you can’t hurt things outside of a challenge. This includes with assailment templets. Yet impact hits, for some reason, get a pass? One of the core things about challenges is that you can’t hit thing that can’t hit you back. Breaking that isn’t fun, and seem abusable.

Skirmisher Get A Nerf

Skirmishers get a couple of rulings as well. The first deals with how to find the center of a unit, which is still kind of annoying. The second is the big one. It clarifies that when charged, or charging any models in a skirmish unit that don’t have the movement to form up lose coherence and are destroyed. OOF! That’s kind of big. This is a major nerf to skirmishers as it greatly increases the chances that both when charging or getting charged you might just lose some models. I guess they get sad their friends are so fast and just die?

This is another ruling that I frankly don’t like (though I will of course, follow). Now, Skirmishers likely do need some toning down as they are very powerful, but this isn’t the way I would do it. I just think it leads to a lot of extra measuring and fiddling around with models to make sure you don’t lose any. More than that however, it’s going to lead to unfun situations. Having large parts of a unit just… vanish, because of a poor charge roll, or slightly off placement isn’t a lot of fun. New players are going to be particularly punished by this. Also… can a character die in this way? Or do they just pop out of the unit? This just isn’t a ruling that makes the game more fun.

FAQ Odds and Ends

A few more bits:

• Rolling a hit when doing random movement (fanatics, vortexes) results in the object not moving. This was hotly debated but now cleared up.
• No armor, shields, etc. does not effect your ward or regen saves.
• All models in a unit can shoot at a Large Target regardless of what rank they are in. A small nerf to big monsters, but I don’t think it’s going to affect dragons a ton.
• You can totally choose which armor you want to use and are not limited to picking the best save value.
• Characters can be placed within a command group. This is an odd one as I thought it was pretty clear they could not be, and I never saw people talking about it. But I guess you can? Odd.
• Potions don’t affect mounts.
• When shooting at a lone character with 3 inches of a friendly unit, only the units within three of them count towards figuring out if they are the closest model. Better be careful!

While that’s not every ruling from the FAQ, those I think are the most important and impactful ones. I encourage everyone to read the FAQ in full. In addition, while I may not agree with all of these rulings, I’m happy to have them. Any answer is better than a open question with no answer that people fight about. Hopefully the team continues to update these.

Let us know what you think of the new FAQ, down in the comments! 

Author: Abe Apfel

Abe is that rare thing, an Austin local born and raised here. Though he keeps on moving around, DC, Japan, ETC., he always seems to find his way back eventually. Abe has decades of experience with a wide range of tabletop and RPG games, from historicals, to Star Wars to D&D and 40K. He has been contributing to BOLS since almost the start, back when he worked at and then owned a local gaming store. He used to be big into the competitive Warhammer tournament scene but age has mellowed him and he now appreciates a good casual match. He currently covers 40K tactics and lore, as well as all things Star Wars, with occasional dabbling in other topics. Abe remains in mourning over the loss of WFB to this day.