Warhammer Army Project/9th edition

Warhammer Army Project, 9th Edition

Created by Mathias Eliasson, this project was a homebrew attempt at giving many of the nations and factions that never got Armybooks of their own (and those left behind and never got one in 8th Edition) such a thing.

It should also be noted that Eliasson is constantly updating his work, so don't expect this page to stay current forever. If anyone wishes to actually update this page and the items that need it, later on, go ahead. (The current edition is 2.1).

This page is devoted to the changes between 8th edition and 9th edition and generalized rules.

Notable differences between Editions

• Always Strikes Last now hurts even harder: If the model's initiative is still below that of its opponent before counting ASL, you must re-roll any successful hits that model makes.
• Breath Weapons can be used multiple turns but after the first use, must roll a 4+ to use it for the round. The template is measured from any point of the model's front arc instead of the mouth.
• Fear is now considerably reworked - No more tests, just a flat +1 to their Combat Resolution. If the Unit Strength of all Fear-causing models in base contact is double or more, it becomes +2.
• Fly no longer has a fixed movement distance, instead being set on a per-unit basis.
• Terror, similarly (will work on units with Fear) but Terror test is taken as normal.
• Flammable units are now subject to Fear when facing any unit with Flaming Attacks.
• Hordes No more fight in extra rank from Hordes. The whole mechanic was removed.
• Poisoned Attacks has been rewritten so that it adds +1 to Wound rather than auto-wounding on a 6 to hit, making them more reliable.
• Quick to Fire weapons can now once per turn be fired when making a charge regardless of the weapons max range, so long as the model doesn't have Move or Fire, though they take a -1 penalty to hit when doing so.
• Failing Stupidity gives one fringe benefit to the victim: Immunity to Psychology. Granted, this is all stuck with the other restrictions, but it makes sure that a squad suffering from it won't break just from getting shot up in the middle of their sudden movement.
• Random Movement now bars units from charging, considering that they can only move during the Compulsory Moves subphase.
• Regenerate has been drastically reworked into being another Ward Save (as of Version 2.1), though one unable to be used against fire, Killing Blow, or Unstable.
• Move or Fire: Now if you're mounted, you can shoot your Handguns and crossbows but suffer additional -1 hit penalty and cannot march. You're unlikely to inflict hurt with 6s, but now repositioning Outriders is less wasteful.
• Swiftstride was rewritten so that it only adds 2d6" movement when a unit with a movement value of 6 or lower charges, while units with higher movement get the classic 3d6 drop the lowest.
  • Flying units count as having Swiftstride when they charge. Conversely, units with Hover can't.
• Killing Blow can actually proc against monsters, though this only deals a wound with Ignores Armour.
• Thunderstomp and vanilla Stomp have been effectively merged into one rule, dealing d6 hits on anyone in b2b, though it's lowered to d3 against lone infantry and skirmishers. It's also unable to interact with anything unless explicitly spelled out.
• Short Range removed.
• Ethereal: No longer makes a unit a binary indestructible or wet paper dependent if the enemy has magic attacks. Gives 2+ Ward Save vs. mundane attacks and 5+ vs. magical attacks.
• Ward Saves Individual ward save can be combined like armour saves to a max of 4++. You can pick which wards to use and combine in a given situation, and individual wards of 3++ or better do exist. If a rule calls for a ward save from a specific source to be rerolled, the reroll works only with that specific ward save, not when it is combined with other wards. A compromise to fix the savage orc Shrunken Head bus problem.
• Armour, in general, has been rewritten in a way that it can add to an existing save, such as Natural Armour or allowing a unit wearing only a shield and no armor in an appreciable way (read, more than just a +1 to an existing save for wearing heavier plate).
  • Parry saves have been reworked a bit. Now cavalry can actually benefit from it, can't be used against attacks with +3 more strength than the user and there's also a Dodge Save that acts as an alternative to this save.
• Spells can actually be duplicated... so long as all available spells from the selected lore have been taken by other wizards in the army. This is especially useful for Orcs & Goblins and Skaven, who are legendarily starved for spells. You can even cast the same spell twice now (though not from the same wizard, and you cannot target the same enemy unit more than once per magic phase with the same spell if it remains in play or lasts more than one player turn).
  • Those models who can select spells, like as if they are bound spells or from some unique wizard rule, cannot select Signature Spells.
  • A callback to older editions, lower-level wizards are now capped on which spells can be picked, which makes duplicating certain spells easier, but will hamper their utility.
  • Rolling for Spells is gone. THANK. FUCK.
  • All wizards know their lore's signature spell, with is an added bonus for those that can pick their spells. That said, this is not given to those who only cast bound spells or those with a fixed repertoire.
  • Some wizards can now pick between two lores, which can open up some real cheese combos on one body, but that makes your wizard all the more a target.
  • Overcharging spells can now be done on the fly without needing to outright declare such before the roll. As long as your casting roll satisfies the new CV, you can do it.
• Irresistible Force has been removed entirely. In its place, any natural 6s you roll when casting/dispelling instead just grants you an additional channeling die to roll on this test, though any 6s you roll on these dice won't generate extras. When you crit, this makes you really hit.
• You must have a minimum of 3 units per 1000 pts deployed normally.
  • A bit of an edit for the allotment for Lords & Heroes - You can only spend up to 25% of your total allotment on Lords, while Heroes can spend up to 35%, so long as the total points allotment for both is equal to 35% of the total points cost. This will (somewhat) curb spamming the shit out of Lords.
• Marching and Restraining from Pursuit do not count as Psychology Tests and are just Ld tests.
• If you destroy a unit before completing a charge (such as spamming Quick to Fire weapons) or it flees your charge, you can redirect it to another unit.
  • As of 2.2 the redirect requires a LD test which is rerollable with champion
• As of 9.61, having more ranks than files is now impossible. Goodbye, bubble-wrapper spearelves. You will be missed.
  • As of Ver 2.2, It's now you can't have more complete ranks than files.
• Shooting no longer has a range penalty, but it has a bonus against targets 4" away or big targets. However, they have a penalty for shooting at a solo model with Unit Strength 2 or less, granting some protection to solo killers like Apophas.
• All shrines can join infantry squads, so now your Hurricanum or Chaos Altar isn't so exposed anymore.
• Skirmishers and Light Cavalry that flee from a charge or flee & fire can run through other units without triggering panic.
• Armor on Chariots stack with the armor of their riders.
  • Also helpful is that any attached heroes also join in these formations without needing the rule.
• Wizards cannot dispel a spell where the total of their natural dice scores is 1 or 2 (regardless of modifiers) and they can't dispel for the rest of the turn.
• Most Fast cavalry get cheaper musicians.
• Remains in Play spells can only be ended at the start of any Magic phase, not any time.
• If your unit has more Unit Strength of your enemy, add +1 to the combat result. No longer requires double Unit Strength.
• A character model that joins a unit of Fast Cavalry gains the Fast Cavalry special rule as long as they stay with the unit. Characters may only join Fast Cavalry with the same Troop Type as them.
• Skirmishers can now course disruptions (requires a unit strength of 10 or more).
• Chariots in the second rank grant +d3 more impact hits to the Chariots in the first rank
• Holes of a pie template from Direct Damage Spells must be placed over an enemy model.
• Fast Cavalry or Skirmishers that chooses Flee or Fire & Flee may reroll rally tests instead of automatically unless they have a Musician.
• Clarify how a Single profile calvery unit works (i.e., Centigors, bull centaurs, dragon ogre), giving them an extra supporting attack.
• Stomp for Cavalry and monstrous cavalry are replaced with Impact hits (1), and mounts also make supporting attacks.

New Rules

• Animated Construct: Now available to other models besides Tomb Kings. They remain Unbreakable and Immune to Poisoned Attacks, but They can never March. They can make any charge reactions available to units with Immunity (Psychology).
  • Undead are also now a type of Animated Construct, but they usually tie in something else like Flammable.
• Aquatic: Replaces Sea Creature. These models treat water terrain as open ground and thus can march through, hold steadfast, and claim rank bonus while in water. Though they might take danger from specific terrain, they won't worry about the terrain in general. In addition, anyone shooting a unit mostly in water take -1 to hit.
• Armour Piercing (X): Technically always existed, but now there are things that can deal more than a -1 save penalty.
  • Ignores Armour Saves: Flat-out ignores armor. It's existed before, but now it's a legit USR
• Dodge (X): A variant of Parry. This save is effective against any attack to their front, including blasts and stomps. The only things that bypass it are ASF (Or being affected by ASF) and magical auto-hits. And that rule that banned Cavalry from using Parry? Now shoved into here.
• Expendable: Units with this rule do not trigger panic tests in other non-expendable models if they break. If a unit with this rule is taken and is a core unit, a non-Expendable core unit must be taken as well. This is typically found on pathetic chaff units like Skavenslaves, Chaos Cultists, and beasts.
• Fly (X): Now can be set in a certain distance, meaning some units can fly faster.
• Ice Attacks: Anyone attacked by a unit with this rule takes -1S and ASL. Fortunately, this unit is also immune to others with this rule.
• Lightning Attacks: Models with this rule gain Ignores Armour against models wearing medium armour or heavier.
• Natural Armour: Replaces Scaly Skin. Gives a basic armour save that can stack with regular armour.
• Mixed Unit: Reserved for units where one sort of model is handling another sort of model (Like hounds and handlers). While Leadership is taken using the highest value in the unit, any other attacks or tests are resolved on the base model's stats. Once the Unit Strength hits below 5, there's now a risk for the handlers to get hurt - when they do take damage, all units have to take one wound before being allowed to hit another.
• Strength Bonus (X): Adds a bonus to the unit's Strength on the first round of any close combat. There's also Charge Bonus (X), which does a similar thing, but only on turns where the unit charges.

Model Types

• Infantry: have a unit strength of 1
• Monstrous Infantry: have Fear and Swiftstride as well as a unit strength of 3, however, they lost stomps
• Cavalry: have Impact Hits (1) on top of Swiftstride and a unit strength of 2
  • Version 1.9 has drastically cut back on what rules affect both the steed and pilot regardless of who has it. Mostly this affects thing like additional saves and ASF. These stipulations also affect MC and chariots.
  • Version 2.2 the rider and mount both make 1 supporting attack. Single-profile cavalry makes 2 supporting attacks instead.
• Monstrous Cavalry: have Fear, Impact Hits (1), and Swiftstride as well as a unit strength of 4
  • Version 2.2 mount also makes 3 supporting attacks, but the rider makes only one. Single-profile Monstrous Cavalry makes 4 supporting attacks instead.
• Swarms: have Expendable, Skirmishers, and Unstable and have a unit strength of 3. Models can shoot past them without regard for LoS. Pieplates deal d6 hits upon them.
• War Beasts: have Swiftstride and Expendable as well as a unit strength of 1
• Monstrous Beasts: have Fear and Swiftstride as well as a unit strength of 3
• Monsters: have Stomp, Swiftstride, Terror, and Towering as well as a unit strength equal to their wound count
  • Mounted monsters are confirmed to have an effective max armour save of 3+, meaning a nat 1 or 2 will always fail.
  • The unit strength of a mounted monster is the monster's wounds+the number of people on top of it
• Chariots: have Impact Hits (d6) and Swiftstride as well as a unit strength equal to their wound count. Specified movement is equal to Beast's -1 (now calculated for you in stat blocks), and can only do Wheeling Manoeuvers. Armour = entry + crews'.
  • Equipping Scythes to a Chariot changes Impact Hits to d6+1.
• War Machines: have a unit strength equal to their wound count
• Shrines: (like the War Altar and Hurricanum) a unit strength equal to their wound count. They are also usually pulled along by an accompanying unit.

Generic Armory

Across the various armies of the Old World, there are things that are pretty much constantly in use no matter who uses them. Swords, axes, shields, these are the things that no army would be without. It should be noted that you can if your unit have multiple weapons that you can only use one for the entire combat, usually a weapon that isn't a hand weapon unless dual-wielding hand weapons or using a shield. You can't change this weapon unless you have rules permitting otherwise.

Melee

• Hand Weapon: Generic CCW.
  • Multiple Hand Weapons: Grants a 6++ parry save and a bonus attack, but counts as a two-hander.
• Polearm/Halberd: +1S Two-hander weapon. Use them to dent armor.
• Greatweapon: +1S two-hander with an additional +1 at the first round of combat (+2S first turn), but your model suffers -2I (Rather than ASL, thankfully) for the big swinger.
• Flail: Two-hander with SB(2) on the first round. Much stronger on the charge or when getting charged, less so after.
• Spear: Adds an extra rank to attack whenever the model doesn't charge. When non-infantry models charge the front, the model gets +1 to S and I. Cavalry with spears get +1 to S and I when they charge.
  • Pike: The next step for spears. +3 fighting ranks, +3 I on a turn they are charged from the front by non-infantry models.
• Lance: Cavalry gets +2 to S and I on the charge.

Ranged

• Shortbow: 18" S3 missile with volley fire and can use Multiple Shots (2) when not moving or using stand and shoot.
  • Bow: Now with a range of 24".
  • Longbow: 30" range now.
• Crossbow: 30" S4 shots, but you have Move or Fire. Decent for basic armor piercing.
• Handgun: Your basic matchlock. 24" S4 shots with Piercing 1, but it's Move or Fire.
  • Pistol: A Handgun with half the range but gets Quick to Fire. used with a hand weapon gives adds +1 attack but Requires Two Hands.
    • Brace of Pistols: Two Pistol gives you Multishot (2) and +1 attack, also Requires Two Hands.
• Javelin: 12" at S:U, but they have Quick to Fire, Piercing 1, and volley.
• Thrown Weapon: Smaller thrown weapons like daggers or shurikens. It only has a range of 8", but it has multishot (2) and Quick to Fire.
  • Throwing Axes: Now with a very short 6", but it has S+1 instead of multishot.
• Sling: Take a shortbow, and replace the volley fire with Piercing 1.
• Blowpipe: short-range with 12" and S1 with multishot (2) and poison (wounding non-poison immune on +5s).

War Machines

• Bolt Thrower: 48" S6 shots dealing d3 wounds and Pierce 1 for additional pain. It it kills the first target, it hits the one behind at S5, then the one behind at S4 and so on until someone fails to die. No longer Ignores Armour, so a 1+ model gets a 5+ save against it, getting better for every rank.
• Cannon: 48" S10 shot that scatters half an artillery die, dealing d6 wounds on whoever it directly lands on (assuming no mishaps). Then you roll the artillery dice again to see how far it rolls on after landing, hitting anyone else for d3 wounds.
  • Great Cannon: A bigger cannon with 60" and always dealing d6 wounds.
  • Grapeshot: You can load up a cannon with random scraps, making 12" S5 and Piercing 1 by a number of shots equal to the artillery dice + d6. Pretty much makes it a close-range murder machine.
• Stone Thrower: 12-60" catapult that throws d6 wound attack as a small pieplate. It deals S10 damage on whoever's directly in the middle of the template, S4 to anyone near enough.
• Fire Thrower: A flamer with S5 flaming attacks and ignores cover.

Armour

• Light Armour: Gives a 6+ save or adds +1 to natural armour.
• Medium Armour: Gives a 5+ save or adds +2 to natural armour.
• Heavy Armour: Gives a 4+ save or adds +3 to natural armour.
• Full Plate Armour: Gives a 3+ save or adds +4 to natural armour. easy come easy go, returned to being an army exclusive.
• Shield: Adds the same as Light Armour, but it also adds another +1 to saves against missiles fired at the model's front if they are Infantry and a 6++ parry save if used with a hand weapon. They don't get a save against missile attack if shot in the rear flank.
  • Buckler: A shield that's now useless for protecting against missiles, but now offers a 6++ parry.
• Barding: Light armor for steeds, with the exchange that it takes -1" from their movement.

Consistent Armybook Differences

• No armies can give champions magic weapons.
• Almost all special monsters moved to rare. WOC chimeras, all Lizardmen Dinos, DE Hydra, all of them.
• Most units are more customizable with less default armour and/or weapons but more options for upgrades. Ex. Bestigors, Dwarf Warriors, Statetroops, Men at Arms, etc.
• Hero choices have lost access to monstrous mounts. No Manticore's on DE Masters, no Griffons on HE Nobles, etc.
• Most armies have lost options when selecting battle magic. Only High Elves, Empire and Lizardmen maintain their 8 choices from 8th edition. No more lore of Metal on Wood Elves or Life on Dark Elves. Chaos Marked characters can only choose their god's lore, the most grievous losses of all.
  • In exchange, almost every army gets their own unique lores. O&G and Skaven even get more lores to avoid spell stagnation. In addition, all lores have their own attributes thanks to not being updated by the editorial whims of what models GW wants to push first.
• Most armies have had their strongest special choices moved to rare. Phoenix Guard, War Hydras, Stegadons, Demigryphs etc.
• Pegasus and variants are now treated as cavalry, so characters can get lookout sir from knights etc.
• A lot of armies have gained some armour saves on footslogging infantry with the addition of medium armour.
• When a Battle Standard Bearer takes an enchanted Standard, it can buy 25pts of Magic gear, allowing them the buff the unit without sacrificing survivability.
• Many core units may now buy a standard up to 25 points.

Warhammer Army Project Tactics Articles
General Tactics	About 9th edition Magic Items Magic Tips Regiments of Renown
Forces of Order	Albion Amazons Bretonnia Cathay Cult of Ulric Dwarf Empire Estalia Halflings High Elves Kingdoms of Ind Kislev Lizardmen Nippon Wood Elves
Forces of Destruction	Beastmen Chaos Dwarfs Daemons of Chaos Dark Elves Orcs & Goblins Skaven Vampire Counts Warriors of Chaos Zombie Pirates of the Vampire Coast
Unaligned	Araby Dogs Of War Hobgoblins Norse Ogre Kingdoms Pirates of Sartosa Tomb Kings