6th Edition Dwarfs

[Thoric]

Hail, Fellow friends!

I would like to ask you an unbiased opinion. In my game group we all decided to stick to 6th edition, because we all agree that is the most balanced edition. But we have a problem about Dwarfs. Should we use the 2000 Army Book or the one of 2005? Of course as a Dwarfs player I would like to use the 2005 book. But I don't want to be biased. I noted that the book looks absolutely 6th edition. The books for the 7th edition have the Army List in the end of the book, not on the middle, it includes the special characters, and the font of the writing is different. But I would like to know different opinions.
Please, let me know what do you think about.

[Just Tony]

If you take a close look at the Army list in the second book, you will notice some.. idiosyncrasies with regard to balance and the other books. A lot of composition breaking things happen in that book which is why I use the first book

[Thoric]

Hello, Tony!

So, if I understood well, you think the second book doesn't have that "balance feature" that is typical of the 6th edition?

[TinyLegions]

Long standing dwarf player here. I played both books, and to be honest, I recommend using the earlier edition of that series for 6th. Concerning the new mechanics, you are not really getting that much more playing the later edition. All the new mechanics really don't do add much to your army, or can be liabilities. I did not see a noticeable difference between my army in the 6th and the 7th, I did win more in the 7th, but that was due to me being a better player, not due to me using their mechanics more. In fact every time that I used something like an Oathstone or Royal Blood, it would either not work or cause more problems. Only thing that I really liked was one or two of the runes that were new, but that is not worth it for me to play that book in my estimation. Those can be house ruled if I really want them.

Similar to what Just Tony said, the balancing aspect of the earlier book is a bit better, and it is not just for Dwarves. I think that JT might agree with me on this, but I for one think that the lists presented in the Chronicles for Bretonnian and Wood Elf are better than what you get from the armybooks if you want to play in the 6th edition.

One thing to remember on all of this is that they started playtesting the 7th edition in 2004 for a release date of 2006, let alone writing for the new edition earlier than that. That means than when they were putting together the last few books, while play testing for the new edition of the game. It was not like in the switchover in the 6th where they had to reinvent the whole game and had to give everyone a Ravening Horde list to tie them over. So that means that from the Brettonia book on forward they likely had the 7th in mind already. The dwarf army book that was released in 2005 was released about 6 months before the new edition dropped.

Ultimately it is your game with your buddies, so if they will allow all of the later books, then by all means go for it. We are not putting together conventions yet, so it does not really matter.

[Thoric]

Hello, TinyLegions!

Thank you for your reply. It is a very articulate and reasonable argumentation. I think I will follow your advice and keep using the 2000 Army Book.
I would really like to exchange opinions with you about the building of a nice Dwarfs Army (we play the classic 2000 pts. size).
I am in love for King Alrik miniature, but I am not sure it is a viable leader for the army.

[TinyLegions]

Hello, TinyLegions!

Thank you for your reply. It is a very articulate and reasonable argumentation. I think I will follow your advice and keep using the 2000 Army Book.
I would really like to exchange opinions with you about the building of a nice Dwarfs Army (we play the classic 2000 pts. size).
I am in love for King Alrik miniature, but I am not sure it is a viable leader for the army.

Absolutely, trading tips on builds is exactly what this board is for. We are not for major powergaming on here, as this edition is more for folks who like the game more than WAAC, but there are pitfalls that I recommend people to avoid. That King Alrik is an awesome figure, and you are likely right about that at 2000. With a larger army the calculus changes, but I think that a good general rule for all named characters regardless of armies is that they really don't fit well in games at 2K points. Dogs of War would be the only exception to the rule given the extensive amount of characters used.

[Jonathan E]

Ultimately it is your game with your buddies, so if they will allow all of the later books, then by all means go for it. We are not putting together conventions yet, so it does not really matter.

Bit of a caveat there. The UK and Poland do have a 'convention' cycle, with a few UK organisers regularly putting on 30-40 person events. The organising for those happens through Facebook rather than forums, because that's where Gamers Of A Certain Age have ended up congregating. This isn't said to correct you for the sake of it, Tiny (promise) - where a player is in the world matters with questions like these, because some circles have gone straight through "your game with your buddies" and back into "there is an event cycle, with the need for a shared language of rules between people who may not know or even like each other that well." From what I gather, the US is much more likely to be on the handful of guys with house rules standard just because it's that much bigger and the interested parties are more spread out. The UK has the lead belt (all those East Midlands towns where every other middle aged bloke has either worked in the wargames industry or knows someone who does), is the home of the game, is of course a lot smaller, there's more fertile ground for event organisation. The Poles are really into organised play, so the moment there's four of them playing the same game there's a tournament on.

That said: "the community" beyond this site has never reached a consensus about the Dwarf book issue. It gets thrashed out at least once a month on the Facebook group, this has been going on for about four years now, and some people will die on the hill that the second book is a schedule slip and SHOULD NEVER BE ALLOWED EVER, others that it's the only way to make Dwarfs fun in sixth edition because the first book is so tactically limited. Why Dwarfs are so divisive I will never know, and it's interesting that you don't see 40K players kicking sand over "3.5" books to anything like the same degree.

This is a really long winded way of saying that who you're playing with and in what context matters a lot more than any one person's opinion on which is the best book. For organised play, it's at the organiser's discretion, and because "the community" has such a bee in its bonnet about this, it's something organisers should rule on straight out the gate. For home games, honestly, try 'em both and see which one tickles your pickle the most.

There's a lot to like about both books. The first is more "sixthy", I feel. It embeds the Anvil of Doom in the magic phase and makes it much more clearly a substitute for Wizards in other armies. It doesn't have any gimmicks like Longbeard Rangers. It has the better version of the Dwarf handgun, absolutely brutal at close range and very good for chasing off fast cavalry and other nuisances with a twelve inch volley. BUT it is undeniably a more pedestrian book that struggles more to reach the centre ground and dictate the flow of the game, which the second book addresses with things like Strollaz' Rune and also, sigh, the Longbeard Rangers. Also shieldbearers and oathstones are really cool substitutes for conventional mounts that the first book is lacking.

Throughout the Classichammer period, Dwarfs were burdened by GW's decision that they should have no cavalry and no monsters and only really defensive magic; it gives them very poor presence in two phases of the game and makes some scenarios an absolute hog to play with them. The second book makes a better attempt at working around those design limitations. I'd say if you're a defensive, play for the draw, boys before toys kind of player, you'll probably enjoy the first one, but if you want agency and decisive action and to feel like you're asking the questions once in a while, go for the second.

[TinyLegions]

An appropriate caveat. You are right, there are other factors in parts out of North America that I don't inherently take into account. Obviously your environment matters out there so take that into account. If they are more traditional in their take then go with the older book, and vice versa. For events that you refer to it boils down to "Hey which book do we use?"

As far as the first book itself, I will have to agree that having more flexibility when it comes to 0-1 units and new runes that the introduced were good introductions. For people who don't know I HATE 0-1 unit restrictions, at least without some way of unlocking their restriction, like how the Lionguard honor adds a slot of for the White Lyons with the High Elves.(paging JT did I get that right?) The introduction of the runes were a nice touch in the second book. Strollaz Rune and MR Kragg the Grimm, were nice additions that I liked. I wished that they did more in the Rune category honestly, as there were more than a few runes that did not make it out the 4th edition book. We used to have a MR of Death which could have easily translated to a rune that allowed for "killing blow," and we also had a common rune that made a weapon armor piercing.

[Just Tony]

I think lion guard just moved them slots, honestly. Now if you run special character Eltharion, the blind version, you get to run as many swordmasters as you want.

[Just Tony]

Also as a caveat, I am a bodies over machines type of player. I definitely swarm people with regiments, preferably core regiments, and I usually am able to pull off a win with that. Well, sometimes. But anyway, I also prefer the first dwarf book because it gives me all the tools I need to pull that off.

[Kakapo42]

The short answer to the question is this:

- If you already love the 6.5 Dwarf book, use that one.

- If you have no strong feelings about either book, try them both out and see which one you like the most.

For me, I am Team 6.5 Book all the way. It was the first Warhammer army book I ever became aware of, ever, and it was the first army book to ever get me at all interested in both Warhammer and fantasy settings in general, ever, appearing as it did in the first ever White Dwarf issue I owned, ever.

So, I feel compelled to throw in a few words for the Red Dwarf Book's favour, as an alternate take from some of the other posters here.

Right off the bat, the 6.5 Book has Shieldbearers as an option for the General. This alone is enough to win me over to that book being superior, because I was raised on Asterix comics and thus if there is a book that will let me put my wise bearded leader dude on a big shield carried by two trusted aides, I will use it. The 6.1 Dwarf book only has one special character with Shieldbearers, and that is some GW writer's wise bearded leader dude, not mine, which is a very big mark against it as far as I'm concerned.

Jonathan already covered the broader points on the army itself - the 2005 Dwarf book features more things like Strollaz Rune and the Rune of Oath And Honour that make Dwarf armies play more dynamically and let Dwarf players seize the initiative and make some proactive moves of their own instead of reacting to the other army all the time, and gives them strategy options besides 'castle up in a corner' and 'pretend you're Vampire Counts and slowly trudge a wall of steel across the board', but I do want to make an extra note on the Anvil of Doom.

The Anvil in the 6.1 Dwarf book being a direct counterpart to Wizards in other armies looks good on paper but tends to be impractical in practice. Not only does it suffer from being the only 'Wizard' in a Dwarf army, which makes it a de facto magnet for every dispel die in the opposing army, but it also tends to suffer from the range of 'spells' available to it. This means that when it finally does get a rune through the opposing dispel barrage, it's almost always some sort of magic missile (only one of the available runes is not a magic missile type power), which is... I mean it's fine if you like using magic missile spells and want more of them, but I personally find it somewhat underwhelming and frustrating, because I normally want my magic doing other things besides landing damage (since killing things is what the rest of my army is for) and a Dwarf army in particular already has plenty of ways to inflict Strength 4 hits at a distance, namely all those lovely handguns and crossbows that half the Core units carry.

The 6.5 Anvil, on the other hand, not only is able to actually do something each turn - always a good move in game design - it also has a wider range of interesting utility support powers to do each turn. It can still drop direct damage on opposing units if you need it to, but it can also rally fleeing units and get them back in the fight or speed a key unit of Dwarfs forward to seize an important location. That makes it a lot more interesting and fun to use in my eyes.

It is for these reasons that I for one find the 6.5 book more fun to use and use that while playing Dwarfs.

It is also worth noting that I am the opposite of Tony, in that I am a very 'toys over boys' type player, to the point where I am more than happy to play a 1000-point Chaos Space Marine army in 40k comprised of just two troop squads and a character loaded with every possible addon they can take. I love extra chrome options and customisation addons, and usually take as many as I can get away with, so naturally I'm going to lean away from the austerity of the 6.1 book.

But this also ties into the broader question of exactly what kind of 6th edition Warhammer you are looking to play in the first place. 6th edition Warhammer has gone through about as many different distinct forms as a Cold War Soviet tank (which is a lot, in case you're not a history nerd), and consequently it exists on a broad spectrum with the austerity of Ravening Hordes on one end and the variety of 6.5 on the other. Exactly where your preferences lie on this spectrum will influence a lot of of your preferences for army rules, and what 6th edition Warhammer looks like to you.

For my part, I want to play with the full, complete 6th edition Warhammer experience, with Kindreds and Virtues and Bloodlines and such. This in turn means that the 6.5 Dwarf book feels more 6th edition to me, because it fits in more seamlessly with the same colourful environment of the Wood Elf, Bretonnian and Vampire Counts books (and really, why should Vampire Counts enjoy a monopoly on cool fun thematic bonuses?), while the 6.1 Dwarf book cannot help but feel like a first draft to my sensibilities. But as you can see from the other comments on this thread, there are many who prefer the elegant simplicity of the other forms of 6th edition.

So, the real question to answer first, is what sort of experience are you, and your gaming partners, looking for in 6th edition Warhammer?

[Thoric]

An appropriate caveat. You are right, there are other factors in parts out of North America that I don't inherently take into account. Obviously your environment matters out there so take that into account. If they are more traditional in their take then go with the older book, and vice versa. For events that you refer to it boils down to "Hey which book do we use?"

As far as the first book itself, I will have to agree that having more flexibility when it comes to 0-1 units and new runes that the introduced were good introductions. For people who don't know I HATE 0-1 unit restrictions, at least without some way of unlocking their restriction, like how the Lionguard honor adds a slot of for the White Lyons with the High Elves.(paging JT did I get that right?) The introduction of the runes were a nice touch in the second book. Strollaz Rune and MR Kragg the Grimm, were nice additions that I liked. I wished that they did more in the Rune category honestly, as there were more than a few runes that did not make it out the 4th edition book. We used to have a MR of Death which could have easily translated to a rune that allowed for "killing blow," and we also had a common rune that made a weapon armor piercing.

Ah! The dear old Master Rune of Death! Until the 5th edition I was used to have King Kazador as my army general.

[Thoric]

The short answer to the question is this:

- If you already love the 6.5 Dwarf book, use that one.

- If you have no strong feelings about either book, try them both out and see which one you like the most.

For me, I am Team 6.5 Book all the way. It was the first Warhammer army book I ever became aware of, ever, and it was the first army book to ever get me at all interested in both Warhammer and fantasy settings in general, ever, appearing as it did in the first ever White Dwarf issue I owned, ever.

So, I feel compelled to throw in a few words for the Red Dwarf Book's favour, as an alternate take from some of the other posters here.

Right off the bat, the 6.5 Book has Shieldbearers as an option for the General. This alone is enough to win me over to that book being superior, because I was raised on Asterix comics and thus if there is a book that will let me put my wise bearded leader dude on a big shield carried by two trusted aides, I will use it. The 6.1 Dwarf book only has one special character with Shieldbearers, and that is some GW writer's wise bearded leader dude, not mine, which is a very big mark against it as far as I'm concerned.

Jonathan already covered the broader points on the army itself - the 2005 Dwarf book features more things like Strollaz Rune and the Rune of Oath And Honour that make Dwarf armies play more dynamically and let Dwarf players seize the initiative and make some proactive moves of their own instead of reacting to the other army all the time, and gives them strategy options besides 'castle up in a corner' and 'pretend you're Vampire Counts and slowly trudge a wall of steel across the board', but I do want to make an extra note on the Anvil of Doom.

The Anvil in the 6.1 Dwarf book being a direct counterpart to Wizards in other armies looks good on paper but tends to be impractical in practice. Not only does it suffer from being the only 'Wizard' in a Dwarf army, which makes it a de facto magnet for every dispel die in the opposing army, but it also tends to suffer from the range of 'spells' available to it. This means that when it finally does get a rune through the opposing dispel barrage, it's almost always some sort of magic missile (only one of the available runes is not a magic missile type power), which is... I mean it's fine if you like using magic missile spells and want more of them, but I personally find it somewhat underwhelming and frustrating, because I normally want my magic doing other things besides landing damage (since killing things is what the rest of my army is for) and a Dwarf army in particular already has plenty of ways to inflict Strength 4 hits at a distance, namely all those lovely handguns and crossbows that half the Core units carry.

The 6.5 Anvil, on the other hand, not only is able to actually do something each turn - always a good move in game design - it also has a wider range of interesting utility support powers to do each turn. It can still drop direct damage on opposing units if you need it to, but it can also rally fleeing units and get them back in the fight or speed a key unit of Dwarfs forward to seize an important location. That makes it a lot more interesting and fun to use in my eyes.

It is for these reasons that I for one find the 6.5 book more fun to use and use that while playing Dwarfs.

It is also worth noting that I am the opposite of Tony, in that I am a very 'toys over boys' type player, to the point where I am more than happy to play a 1000-point Chaos Space Marine army in 40k comprised of just two troop squads and a character loaded with every possible addon they can take. I love extra chrome options and customisation addons, and usually take as many as I can get away with, so naturally I'm going to lean away from the austerity of the 6.1 book.

But this also ties into the broader question of exactly what kind of 6th edition Warhammer you are looking to play in the first place. 6th edition Warhammer has gone through about as many different distinct forms as a Cold War Soviet tank (which is a lot, in case you're not a history nerd), and consequently it exists on a broad spectrum with the austerity of Ravening Hordes on one end and the variety of 6.5 on the other. Exactly where your preferences lie on this spectrum will influence a lot of of your preferences for army rules, and what 6th edition Warhammer looks like to you.

For my part, I want to play with the full, complete 6th edition Warhammer experience, with Kindreds and Virtues and Bloodlines and such. This in turn means that the 6.5 Dwarf book feels more 6th edition to me, because it fits in more seamlessly with the same colourful environment of the Wood Elf, Bretonnian and Vampire Counts books (and really, why should Vampire Counts enjoy a monopoly on cool fun thematic bonuses?), while the 6.1 Dwarf book cannot help but feel like a first draft to my sensibilities. But as you can see from the other comments on this thread, there are many who prefer the elegant simplicity of the other forms of 6th edition.

So, the real question to answer first, is what sort of experience are you, and your gaming partners, looking for in 6th edition Warhammer?

Definitely, "Balance" is the keyword in what we are looking for.

[TinyLegions]

I think lion guard just moved them slots, honestly. Now if you run special character Eltharion, the blind version, you get to run as many swordmasters as you want.

Really? I thought that it added one more lion Guard to the army. I have my books under a lot of boxes right now, so I can't get to them easily. Ill take your word for it, though.

[TinyLegions]

Ill be honest that one of only thing that I like from the Wood Elf and Bret books are the virtues and Kindreds. I consider them to be skillsets, and I do like the concept. It allows for more of a customization of your army as well as characters, and whether you are spending it on magic items or skillsets, can provide a good flavor. Should all books have something like it? No, but I can see a lot of uses for this mechanic if done well.

[Just Tony]

This one turned out legible enough...

[Just Tony]

Weird that my attachment won't show up on my work computer...


Anyway, you asked my opinions about the two Dwarf books? I hit the wayback machine and found the old classichammer post:


*ahem*

So yeah, time to break it down line by line...

Handguns. The Dwarf handgun went from Move and Fire, +1 to hit at close range to Move OR Fire, and +1 to hit at all times. With no change to cost, btw.

Royal Blood. This rule basically nerfs the one restriction to Longbeards, and makes Hammerers FAR more useful. More on both later. At least the Lord is 10 points more.

The Anvil of Doom. I like it much better when it was spells as it was basically Mistress of the Marsh, Master of Stone, Forked Lightning, and Fiery Blast. In the second book it became buffs done in shooting with activation rolls rather than casting, and the only plus is that it has a rather vicious miscast table if you decide to go full bore with your runes. AND it dropped 25 points.

Longbeards. So Longbeards before were straightforward: more skilled Dwarf Warriors that are Immune to Panic. The newer book added from that, taking them out of Special and making them upgrades to Core Warriors, AND added a 6" range Panic reroll ability for any Dwarf unit as long as the Longbeards aren't fleeing. For the exact same points cost. Wow. At least you can't have more Longbeards than Warriors... unless you run a Lord in which case you can.

Miners. Now, moving Miners from Core to Special wasn't such a massive deal, as they were 0-1 in the first place. Except they also lifted the 0-1 AND gave them new wargear that allowed them to reroll their Underground Advance roll. And they got a point cheaper, but at least the reroll device which also counts as a +3 S Great Weapon costs 25, so it evens out, I guess.

Slayers. Did they really need to give Slayers both types of axes? Whatever happened to hard choices? And no longer 0-1, but at least moved to Rare. At no change in points.

Hammerers. So the 0-1 is dropped. Now ALL Hammerers are Stubborn instead of the general activating that ability, and the Royal Blood rule gives them Immunity to Fear and Terror. Oh, and they are 2 points cheaper as well.

THOSE are the biggest gripes I have with the newer book, and it's proof positive of why you shouldn't let someone write an army book when it's their favorite army.

[Brr-icy]

6th book, weak. Like easy win. Predictable game as there's basically one way to play the army, leading to repetitive games. 6.5 has more variety, still not strong, put it about mid tier in the rankings maybe, better than the 6th, but not even close to the top. I personally enjoy fighting against 6.5 much more as it provides a challenge rather than a mountain of immovable dwarfs