Why 8th edition is the best!

Over at Warhammer-Empire, I posted the following in regards to why 8th is the best.

I want to post them here to show the contrast of 8th in particular from the 6 and 7 editions.


- 6th edition armies books were terrible in terms of background and dropping lots of units from the previous editions (i.e. Empire Steam Tanks, the War Alter, Halflings, Forest Goblin Spider Riders, most of the classic special characters, etc.). 7th edition books were better. 8th edition books - awesome! This part of the hobby is extremely important me, hence I can't get excited about the 9th Age.

- The high powered spells in 8th really are not so bad. What was bad? The way you generated power/dispel dice in 6th and 7th. Players could bring ultra-heavy magic with loads of pre-determined power dice. It also forced players to spend a lot of points on magic defense.

- Vampire and Daemons were totally crazy in 7th, and Vampire and Skaven were extremely good in 6th. The outnumbered/auto flee from Fear was also super powerful. Dark Elves and High Elves extremely underpowered in 6th. The only book I'm disappointed with in 8th is Tomb Kings, a few tweaks though and they are back to par (not to mention Undead Legions fix them).

- Lots of ways to build stupid armies in 6 & 7, entire legions of march blockers and shooters which made the game zero fun to play. The Dark Rider army, the skirmishing skink army, etc. In 8th these armies can be made but they are not as effected, they are balanced.

- Perhaps one of the best rules of 8th over the other editions: is that you can still march if you pass a LD test first. Auto march blocking was the most annoying thing in previous editions. "I'll place my scouts and flyers to ensure half of your army cannot move properly, HAHAHA!"

- The 8th edition random charge distance actually prevents a lot of non-sense from happening.

- 8th edition has a large amount of supplements in addition to the army books (which I'm a huge fan of): Storm of Magic (one of my all-time fav supplements, tons of fun), Triumph & Treachery, the series of 5 End Times books, Blood in the Badlands, 2 huge books from Forge World, including the long awaited return of Chaos Dwarfs. 6th edition has the Storm of Chaos (which was very cool), and 7th edition - nothing?

- 8th editon, more ranks = steadfast, finally infantry are good! Many tournament players didn't like this because they had to use rank & file now. No more all skirmisher armies!


I'm sure there is much more, but these are things that immediately stick out in my mind.


I wanted to put this here too:

This is one reason I like 8th the best: 8th is truly the hardest for players to break compared to other editions. For example, these big four things prevent a lot of non-sense:

1. 2D6 magic dice

2. Random charge distant

4. Pass a LD test in order to avoid march blocking

3. More ranks = steadfast

Many players hate those 4 things. Do you know why? because it makes it so much harder to exploit the game.