Skirmish Allegiance Abilities

[Joeggrenaut]

So, the Skirmish rules state "in a Skirmish battle, your warband can only use the allegiance abilities of the Grand Alliance from which they hail" (i.e. no sub-faction specific Allegiance abilities). Does this mean they get access to the appropriate Grand Alliance battle traits as well? The battle traits seem usable for every faction but Order. According to the General's Handbook, Order's battle trait is: "You can re-roll battleshock tests for friendly Order units that are within 12" of your general or another Hero from your army in the battleshock phase." Since battleshock in skirmish is done on a collective warband basis rather than per unit, the rules get a little muddy here. If this is the case, then some special stand-in house-rules might need to be put in place for the Order battle trait during a Skirmish battle, or maybe traits should be omitted entirely.

Looks like there might be some similar issues with a few warscroll abilities as well. The only one that I've noticed so far is the Arkanaut Admiral's Command Ability which allows friendly Kharadron Overlords units within 12" of him to ignore battleshock. Once again, doesn't really fit Skirmish because individual models don't take battleshock tests, the entire warband does. Thoughts?

[Sactownbri]

Command abilities are chosen on page 17 so the Admirals command abilities on the warscroll don't apply. And yes we've been playing it such that Order can reroll battleshock if the models are all within the Generals 12" bubble. If someone is out and Order fails, then thats the model that runs away. At least that's how we've played it and it works well for us.


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[ZephyrExia]

1 hour ago, Sactownbri said:

Command abilities are chosen on page 17 so the Admirals command abilities on the warscroll don't apply.

This is not true.

Pg16 THE GENERAL: Your general cannot use the Inspiring Presence command ability found on the Warhammer Age of Sigmar rules sheet, though you are free to use any command ability on their warscroll. Alternatively, you can generate a command ability for your general from the table on page 17.

In any case, in regards to the battle shock rules, I'd say as the general's bravery is used for the warband, so the Order trait allows the general to reroll this test (as he is within X distance of himself) and the Admiral makes himself (and by extension, the warband) immune to battle shock.

Or, if your opponent won't agree to this, just roll on the table presented in the skirmish book.

Either way, we won't know until it gets a faq.

[Sactownbri]

This is not true.
Pg16 THE GENERAL: Your general cannot use the Inspiring Presence command ability found on the Warhammer Age of Sigmar rules sheet, though you are free to use any command ability on their warscroll. Alternatively, you can generate a command ability for your general from the table on page 17.
In any case, in regards to the battle shock rules, I'd say as the general's bravery is used for the warband, so the Order trait allows the general to reroll this test (as he is within X distance of himself) and the Admiral makes himself (and by extension, the warband) immune to battle shock.
Or, if your opponent won't agree to this, just roll on the table presented in the skirmish book.
Either way, we won't know until it gets a faq.

Didn't I say pick from page 17 so that the warscroll ability doesn't apply? ROW, ROI, FAQ, blablabla. If you are arguing about the game perhaps the game isn't the problem.


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[Naflem]

So if you choose not to pick from page 17, there's nothing that says you cannot use the Overlords ability, so what does a 12 inch Battleshock immunity bubble do in this circumstance? 

[TheOtherJosh]

IMO: If all your models are within 12" of the General, then you don't need to take the battleshock test? If you have any models outside of the 12" bubble you have to take the test. And those would be the models you would have to choose from when removing models.

 

Alternately, not allow that rule. As it's basically the same as Inspiring presence. Which was removed as an option.

 

Alternately, roll a die and whomever wins the roll off gets to choose.

[bottle]

Yes, it's quite clunky in my opinion. This is why Hinterlands removed allegiance abilities and command abilities and gave each GA a choice of two skirmish tailored Command Traits to use. Kept the flavour of each GA but didn't lead to any rules that couldn't interact with the game.

As for the Order Battle Trait. Currently in GHB you can make a model in a unit your General for regular AoS. If that's the case the unit is always within 12" of the general because the general is part of the unit. In skirmish your Warband is treated as a single unit for Battleshock. For this reason I would play in Skirmish that as long as your general (or a HERO) is alive you can reroll battleshock, and don't need to worry about models being in 12" because the general is part of the unit/Warband and so is within 12" of himself at all times.

I don't think there is a definitive correct answer though because the rules don't interact in a clear way.

[TheOtherJosh]

As an FYI, we've been thinking about the the KO battleshock rule wrong.

 

The KO ability applies to "Units" taking battleshock tests.

 

Like it was mentioned by the OP:

 

In Skirmish, units don't take battleshock tests.

 

The entire warband takes a battleshock test.

 

So, any Allegiance ability or hero/General's ability that modifies battleshock for a Unit wouldn't apply.

 

 It isn't that the Warband is treated as a single unit, it takes a special warband Battleshock test. Nowhere in the Battleshock tests section does it talk about units...

 

You could think of it as a "bottle" test for the army... but handled on a per model basis. More like SW:Armageddon.

 

 As an aside, that does make some allegiance or General's abilities completely useless. The nice thing is that there are alternates that one can choose from.

 

[misthv]

So what do you think about p16 under Battleshock tests "Do not use the normal rules..."?

I don't think the order allegiance ability applies... 

[TheOtherJosh]

You're right the order ability doesn't apply.

 

The order ability is applying to Units. Units don't actually make Battleshock tests in Skirmish.

 

It's one of the ones that are technically useless.

 

Nice thing is you can choose a different one from the available options.