Warhammer+ presenter Nick has been involved in the Warhammer Underworlds Community since the day the game was released all the way back in 2017, and he has run over 70 clashes here at Warhammer World. He’s so excited about the new edition that he sent us his top 10 changes from the point of view of someone who plays a lot.
1: Everything is available, all the time!
Nick: Right now, getting hold of certain warbands that are legal in the game is pretty difficult. You might end up scouring independent stores for old boxes or hunting down models online to get that warband you really want. That means you have to be super lucky – or some sort of Warhammer detective – to keep up with the game. Well, that’s a thing of the past. Now, only warbands and cards that you can actually buy from Warhammer.com, a Warhammer shop or independent trader, or that have recently been available, can be used in events making it fairer and more accessible for everybody.*
2: Warscrolls and new cards
Nick: The new Warscrolls replace the old faction decks, providing loads of great character for your warband in one easy to read place. Those once-per-game abilities mean you’ve got to really think how you’re going to use them, and they provide some great cinematic moments. Now the Inspire condition is the same for every fighter, things become so much simpler, and there will be fewer gotcha! moments as your opponent can take a quick read of the Warscroll and know what your warband can do really quickly.
And let’s talk about the new design of the cards for a moment: just look at those vibrant, punchy pictures of miniatures being used to illustrate each. It’s a real shift for Warhammer Underworlds cards and it just looks great!
3: Simpler rules are great for everyone
Nick: When Wintermaw was released, the rulebook for Warhammer Underworlds was well over 30 pages long, full of charts, diagrams and explanations that some new players might have found difficult to read through – and that’s without the huge errata and FAQ documents to cover the thousands of cards in circulation. Well, the new edition has gone totally the other way with rules that are written simply and clearly but still just as tight as current players have come to expect.
This will make it so much easier for new players to begin their journey in the Underworlds and that means more opponents for all of us and a bigger community. That’s just an all-round win.
4: Defining warbands and decks
Strike
Charge into the fray to attack your foe.
Take and Hold
Control the battlefield and hold treasure tokens.
Mastery
Unique goals that change the way you play.
Flex
A combination of two or more playstyles.
Nick: The language of how each warband was meant to play was something experienced players would understand, with words like “aggro” and “control” banded around – but they were never fully explained by the rules. On top of that, to find out whether a universal deck would work with your warband, you’d have to either research it online, or buy them first and find out. Now, warbands are defined clearly by the games designers: Strike (trying to kill stuff), Take and Hold (hold those objective markers), Mastery (harder to use but with huge rewards ) and Flex (does two or more of the above!).
Players will know immediately whether a warband suits their style of play and if a deck works well . This just makes life so much easier for everyone.
5: Less bloat, more balance
Nick: Let’s talk about the Thundertusk in the room. For those of us who have collections of cards spanning many years, it’s tough to hear that those are not going to be part of the game anymore. We’ve spent a long time collecting them, organising them, and loving them. But if we’re honest, we can also admit, hand on heart, that the game had just got too big.
With over 60 warbands, each with their own Faction Deck, and all those extra Rivals decks, Warhammer Underworlds had become as big and bloated as a Great Unclean One. This new edition is necessary to keep our beloved game fresh, exciting, and balanced, as well as welcoming to new players. It might be hard to come to terms with but this really is the right thing for the game.
BUT this new edition is also a great chance for all of us to learn together as one; which deck works best with each warband? What combos and tricks can we find? It’s a great and exciting time for the game, and it’s been made fairer for everyone. It’s a new era for Warhammer Underworlds and one we can all enter together.
6: So long, longboarding!
Nick: Longboarding was a tactic where warbands which preferred to sit back and play passively could set up the boards lengthwise, so their opponents had no hope of getting into a fight.
The new boards put the war back into Warhammer Underworlds, getting the players stuck in and making the game all the more fun for both sides. There will be no more spending a whole battle round just moving your models up the board: you can get straight into the thick of the fighting from the first activation. Much more exciting!
7: Bounty and upgrade costs
Nick: A really nice addition to the game in Embergard is that the Bounty award for killing fighters and the cost to allocate upgrades is variable – and killing particularly powerful fighters could earn two or three Glory Points. For example, Farasa and Yurik of the Emberwatch are worth two Glory apiece, and the leader Ardorn is worth three! Killing all three is worth a mighty seven Glory. Good luck with that, though…
You’ll also notice that every warband gives away roughly the same amount of Glory in Bounty, regardless of how many fighters it has, which is a really nice touch.
Upgrades are varied in price too, and the more powerful ones may cost two Glory to apply. You’ll find some even cost no Glory at all! This has allowed the rules writers to come up with lots of upgrades with varied levels of power and cost them appropriately. So look out for some seriously powerful upgrades!
8: The Focus ability
FOCUS
Taking stock of the situation, the warband quickly changes tack.
You can discard any number of cards from your hand. Then draw a replacement card of the same type for each card you discarded. Then you can draw 1 additional Power card. You have Focused.
Nick: We’ve all played that game where you draw up five Upgrades and no Glory, and you just can’t do anything. It can really shut your game down and render you powerless to respond to the enemy or make any of your plans work. Or how about when you have those three Objective Cards in your hand that you can’t score?**
Say hello to the new Focus ability, which you can use in one of your turns instead of activating a fighter. Now instead of simply drawing one Power Card or discarding and drawing one Objective as an activation, you can ditch as many cards as you like from either hand and redraw back up. It takes up just one of your turns, but it can really get you out of a bind, or help you find that crucial Objective you know is in your deck somewhere. This is a huge win and will really make your games more enjoyable.
9: Reuse that Glory!
Nick: You still need Glory Points to use Upgrades in the new edition, but there’s no more spending it. Instead, simply make sure the total cost of your upgrades is equal to or less than your current Glory score. And here’s the cool bit – when a model is slain, you remove all of its Upgrades.
Lets say, for example, that one fighter dies with six Glory Point's worth of upgrades. Those upgrades are discarded, which means all of a sudden you find yourself with six Glory spare to spend on new upgrades. Recycling Glory in this way means you're going to be able to get more of those upgrades in play – this is something you should really think about when designing your decks.
10: Crit happens!
Nick: That moment where you put three Ploys into one attack, rolling four successes on five attack dice – only to have it bounce because your opponent rolled a cheeky crit on their save dice? Yep. I know that moment well, and so do you. It’s great when you roll that crit but not so great when your opponent keeps rolling those crit defences!
In Embergard, crits are still great – they might activate weapon rules, allow you to Overrun in attack or Stand Fast in defence. But they will now just count as any other success; they won’t override every other success you roll so there won’t be that moment where you feel you should apologise to your opponent because they just turned the colour of a Bloodletter after you rolled your third crit defence of the battle round.
Thanks, Nick! Catch him and his fellow WarhammerTV presenters Josh and Ed this Friday on Warhammer Embergard: First Play at 6:00pm BST on the Warhammer YouTube channel –when you can see the game in action for the very first time.
* We'll have more information on Organised Play soon.
** Often called a 'bricked hand'
