Warhammer 40K: New Assault Rules – What to Expect for Your Game
Today we’re digging into the new 40K 11th Edition assault rules to see just how much they will shake up your game.
This week we got some more info on 11th edition and the new assault rules from GW. The rules are somewhat the same with some slight tweaks. The shifts will change the game pretty heavily and remove some of the old issues we had in 10th Edition. There were a ton of times we had the assault phase be the defining skill that would showcase the player skill difference. Here’s what you should look out for.
2″ Engagement Range
Let’s start with the first big change – the move to a 2” Engagement range. Now this doesn’t mean you only need to get within 2” to charge – it instead means that models and units can be farther away when they “reach” combat. This lets you remove some of the weird I’m 1 inch away from the wall sort of things which is important in the new game where objectives are terrain pieces with walls. The GW Design Team didn’t want a game where you can get into these stalemates where you can’t really do anything. The big point to remember is that while engagement range is 2” it doesn’t mean your charge out of Deep Strike (which is now 8” away instead of 9”) is still a 9 inch charge.
Simplified Charge Rolls
The next shift is how you roll charge rolls. You no longer have to pick a target and instead you see if you are within 12” of any enemy unit, roll your charge rolls, and that will determine how far you could go. If you roll high enough to engage multiple units within your 12” range – you can do it. If you can only make the closest one you go to that one. There isn’t the time when you had to hem and haw about declaring all available targets and instead can just throw the bones and see what you can do. This is a huge shift and something I think that will let games move a bit faster and just let the charge have a ton more options when choosing to barrel into combat.
Cleaned Up Pile-Ins
The next shift is how the player whose turn it is does all their pile-ins at once. This again allows a little bit of a shift into making the game a bit smoother as you move all your models. The interesting thing in this is while you move everyone at once you still get another move – if your opponent pulls models from the fight you were initially engaged with. The Overrun Fight move lets you move again and get your units that were engaged but all of a sudden fell out of it. Think of how you charge a vehicle with multiple units, one kills the vehicle, and then enemy piles away from you. Now the extra units gets to move again to overrun into the enemy and still get to fight. This means that no matter what you really can’t escape a fight if you are too close to the enemy.
Who Really Fights First
The final big shift is the change in Fights First. The controlling player now gets to pick the first Fights First interaction. This means the charging player with his units get to at least pick one of the charging units to fight. This is a big shift and removes some of the defensive power of the Fights First ability as a player is always able to get at least one interaction onto that unit. I think this is a pretty good change and lets the power be something that could show up more. Currently it is such a powerful piece of tech and something players have to work around to do the violence they need to do against an enemy prepared to punch you in the face.
What Matters Most With New Assault
I think the biggest change is the shift into 2” Engagement range. Thankfully you can move within engagement range of the enemy and just can’t end within 2”. This will mean that players can block you out of going into the terrain piece they are guarding pretty easily. GW appears to want you to punch your way to victory if you can’t shoot them to pieces. It does mean that armies can’t just sit there and blast you to death while tip toeing into a building and hold it. If you are able to block them out they can’t just move in and while they shoot you to death you still “hold” that objective or at least keep them at bay. This is going to be important versus the Imperial Knight armies and other big model choices as they can’t just easily take an objective if you have ringed the inside of the terrain piece with your cannon fodder.
I also think the changes to how we charge and engage stuff will shift things a bit as the desire to get into combat to score and win will be huge. I still think shooting is just going to erase people but again that just means sticky objective rules, sticky on death rules, and other fun “scoring defensive” rules are going to be big in 11th Edition. I also think the pile-ins all at once are going to be a huge factor in figuring out who is the better player in a lot of games. You will need to ensure your initial charges are set up well enough to take advantage or poor placement.
It is an exciting time to see all the new rules coming out. How are you feeling about the upcoming changes? Are you ready to throw off the shackles of 10th and head to the glory land that is 11th?
