Independent National Warhammer 40,000 Tournament FAQ v2.1
In 2007 a group of players from DakkaDakka joined forces to tackle the problem of poor FAQ/errata updating from Games workshop, and came up with a totally unofficial FAQ that addresses various known unresolved rules issues currently prevalent.
They resolved these issues by either following and clarifying RAW; or by making judgments where RAW is confusing, 'unfun' or just plain wrong; or by reversals of official GW FAQs. All these methods are noted next to each rule issue within the pdf so you can see how each ruling decision has been reached.
The v2.1 update and the Dark Angels
Recently updated in January '09 was a Version 2.0 pdf.
For the Dark Angels it wasn't particulalrly good as it went against our Codex and didn't allow Ravenwing Attack Squadron's Attack Bikes and Tornados to remain scoring at all times as clearly stated in our Codex (p27).
However after a couple of weeks a Version 2.1 appeared which amongst other changes elsewhere reversed the above decision and followed our DA Codex as RAW. It's great that at last a Codex is taken seriously and trumps the Rulebook as was always intended – despite the fact that Land Speeders are vehicles and they and Attack Bikes are not even Troops if Sammy isn't taken!
Good news for us and good news for RW players at this years' Adepticon.
A few other interesting points:
- Models in terminator armour are not counted as stationary when firing the rapid fire part of a combi-weapon. This means they can't get the one shot at maximum range when firing that part of their weapon if they moved. One to watch out for. Oh if only DA termies were Relentless as in Codex Space Marines. Luckily though – our Codex allows models in termy armour to assault after firing rapid-fire weapons.
- The Narthecium can't be used against a wound that would cause 'Instant Death' if the model wasn't immune to Instant Death. This is a rules change.
- A unit with ATSKNF that regroups only gets its normal move and doesn't get the regroup (3") too. This is a rules change.
A bit of background on the FAQ
The FAQ is divided into sections covering the main Rulebook, individual Codex queries, subdivided in the Space Marine's case into smaller Chapter sections, the Forge World Imperial Armour series, and the two 40,000 Expansions. There is quite a lot of ground covered and although some might argue the conclusions of one or two rulings given, no one can take away the fact that at last, an up to date FAQ has been methodically produced that tackles these things head on in their entirety.
From the introduction:
"This FAQ is a completely 100% independent (unofficial) Q&A list for the game of Warhammer 40,000 5th edition. It isn't meant to replace the Games Workshop official FAQs (which can be downloaded from:
www.gamesworkshop.com in any way, and in fact the issues addressed by the GW FAQs aren’t included in this document.The purpose of this FAQ is to give players advance knowledge of how tournament judges will be ruling the myriad of tricky situations that arise in games of 40k at the event they are planning to attend."
The FAQ was written and edited by Jon “yakface” Regul from the DakkaDakka forum, with the a ruling council comprised of Jon “yakface” Regul, Bill “Centurian 99” Kim, Hank “Muwhe” Edley, Greg "Inquisitor_Malice" Sparks, Matthias Weeks, Christopher Mehrstedt, Dave Creswell, Colin Vasconcelles and Jeff Chua.
Produced originally for the US non-GW tournament circuit (V1.1 used for instance at Adepticon 2008 last year) – this FAQ has become accepted as being the most comprehensive produced and is being adopted by many gaming groups and competition organisers where no better rules authority exists.
I think it is a great initiative and wholeheartedly support it. So spread the word and use the pdf.
