Highs and Lows of the new FAQ

[Sybrite]

incase you don't have it yet:
>> http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_...nuary_2012.pdf <<

let's start off with the Highs:
1) Hallelujah!! shadows in the warp has be fixed! Yay's to nolonger seeing psykers shield their minds by hiding their bodies in vehicles -kudos GW for pulling your head out of your ______.

2) Tyrant Guard kinda elevated into retinue status, as a unit of TGuard with attached Tyrant are now only a single kill point

3) Impaler Cannons get a boost, 'artificial' cover saves cannot be taken against their wounds, basically a full RAW that only allows cover if the target is inside or base contacted to an actual terrain feature. (artificial as in kustom force field, Conceal, Spore cloud, etc...). Some probably played it this way before, but a few like myself basically played it as you ignore cover granted by obstructions between the hive guard and target, like firing through another unit; and let things like KFF still work for squishy models (as AoB caught, vehicles should still be fine as the FAQ only highlited 'Wounds').

4) ICs benefiting from tervigon biomorphs. basically this expanded the previous FAQ that if you stuck a Prime in a unit of termagants, that prime could suffer wounds when the nearby tervigon bit the dust. So now that Prime could get free poison and furious charge & counter attack, though I'm still wondering what/why people were sticking Primes in with termagants.

5) GKs getting added to the list for lashwhips. not a big boost but it means that most lashwhip toting bugs will strike before a nemisis force halbred (well assuming they forgot to bring their dirty gas grenades)


Some lows:
1)Tyrants and TGuard get twisted. can only join at deployment. As mentioned in the highs it seems like a push to retinue status, but without a few of the more subtle details. Like both are still separate HQ choices which really only matters in the Dawn Of War deployment, which means you'll have to 'deploy' them as walk-ons or from reserves if you want your tyrant in the same unit as TGuard. But aside from DoW this doesn't really cause much of a problem.

2)Venonthropes (Spore cloud) got nerfed
not that this effects many armies out there (as almost everybody else has assault grenades) but now taking the spore cloud's dangerous terrain test will not reduce grenadeless opponent's to I1. which is a complete contradiction of the main rules

To represent this, if an assaulting unit had to take a difficult or dangerous terrain test during their assault move, all of its models have their Initiative value lowered to 1 when attacking, regardless of other Initiative modifiers.

3) Acid Blood has to take an extra step on walkers. could have just been me reading the rule wrong to begin with, but I interpreted it as squishies took the initiative test, dreads took the 4+. but anyways now its everything takes the Initiative test, then dreads do the 4+ for a glance (oh well, I don't take that biomorph anyway lol )

some 'meh' moments, more like, "Someone nitwit really asked that?":
- can't deploy closer than 1" to a spore mine.
- Venomthropes do benefit from their own spore cloud
- lictor broods have to maintain unit coherency
- ICs can't piggyback lictor deployment < now this I'll give a penny for creativity, but if you check the IC 'Special Rule' paragraph on pg 48 of the BRB, it should have been obvious you can't do this from the start.
- SitW gets switched to +d6 rather than 3d6, I guess in a way this is a boost vs Eldar, so runes of witnessing tests are going to be 4d6 -highest die roll. almost was a bust, but the new Eldar FAQ removes the codex portion of only using the two lowest dice, so eldar will still get stuck with 3 dice on their psy tests.

would have really liked to have seen boneswords getting some clarity, but suffice to say I'm pretty happy with SitW hurting psychic passengers.

[scythes]

Not a bad FAQ for Nids, the grenades thing with the Venomthrope makes no sense, but since all Marines get frags I guess it kind of does, can't have them at the bottom of the barrel. Anyway, this FAQ is much better than the last one that came out.

[Angelofblades]

3) Impaler Cannons get a boost, 'artificial' cover saves cannot be taken against their shots, basically a full RAW that only allows cover if the target is inside or base contacted to an actual terrain feature. (artificial as in smoke launchers, kustom force field, Conceal, Spore cloud, etc...). Some probably played it this way before, but a few like myself basically played it as you ignore cover granted by obstructions between the hive guard and target, like firing through another unit; and let things like smoke launchers still work.

I'm going to have to correct you on this, like I've had to correct everyone else. Let me quote the FAQ first.

Q: Can a unit take cover saves from any source other
than the terrain they are in, or touching, against
Wounds caused by an impaler cannon? (p47)
A: No.

This is a direct word for word, letter for letter copy paste from the FAQ.

Notice that "Wounds" is capitalized. What do vehicles NOT have. Thus your listing of Smoke Launchers is incorrect as well as any other "artificial" cover saves that vehicles can get. Vehicles will still get saves from Smoke Launchers, Flat Out, psychic powers that provide cover saves or wargear. Models with a wound characteristic however, will gain no such benefit.

You HAVE to be nitpicky in this case. The word wounds is started off Capitalized, meaning, they meant it to be specific.

[Sybrite]

You HAVE to be nitpicky in this case. The word wounds is started off Capitalized, meaning, they meant it to be specific.

good catch AoB, it's the trouble with doing a quick rightup in the middle of the night; editted my original post

[Angelofblades]

No worries, it started when one of our players exclaimed that the new faq allowed him to bypass smoke launchers, and I knew that was wrong, so when I checked it, I saw what the issue was.

[Cryage]

Venomthrope spore cloud didnt get nerfed, it got clarified. Everybody i know played it the way the FAQ states. If you read it it says you take a dangerous terrain test , it says nothing about having to make a difficult terrain test to be able to assualt. Still, 17% chance per model assaulting you that has 1W will die before it gets to swing is good.

[Architech]

renews my want to rebuild my nids for 5th

[Sybrite]

@Cryage , becoming I1 for taking a dangerous terrain test is straight out of the main rule book (pg36) I quoted the exact line that says so.
-but as I also said, in the grand scheme of codexes that FAQ change/clarification doesn't really put a big impact on the game, since the vast majority of armies have assualt grenades (which nullify the Initative penalty for assaulting with a difficult/dangerous test (also on BRB pg36)

[Cryage]

Guess as a fluff standpoint everybody I've played with always just assumed that the spore cloud was more of an acidic fog and understood the RAI and didnt rule lawyer RAW.

Also, as you mentioned all other armies pretty much have assault grenades , so the only time it would have been beneficial would have been against another tyranids army