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My opponent played with the character Athelstan last night and we had a question regarding his "Emperor of Britain" ability. If a unit is "upgraded" with say, Danish Axes, does the unit take on both the abilities and the drawbacks usually associated with those weapons (in the case of Danish Axes, a +1 to attack rolls but a -1 to armor value in melee; in the case of javelins, a -1 to armor value; in the case of mounted javelins, a -2 to armor value; and in the case of bow, a -1 to armor value). Thanks.

Mark

Javelins do not come with a fixed -1 armour penalty. Usually the troops that are equipped with them have another reason for their lower armour ie: the Welsh being poor, the Bretons being scared of melee ..

True, but the ability reads that the Anglo Saxon unit is mustered "AS Welsh javelins" or "AS continental mercenaries" (for bow) so, if they are labeled as Welsh do they get the Welsh penalty? I think only Normans can have anything other than levy bow (with William the Bastard), so do the Anglo Saxon warrior bow, which are labeled as "continental mercenaries" get a -1 armor because of the bow or not, since Normans do not have a subtraction due to the faction like the Welsh (same thing with the Danish Axe, the subtraction is for the weapon, not the nationality, I think).

Mark

They would get the penalties as you suggest as the unit becomes Welsh javeliners. Also, in these rules, with every weapon advantage comes a disadvantage to balance out.

The Javelin's disadvantage is its range of M, not any inherent armour penalty (unlike the Crossbow).

It's not the weapon that has advantages but the model. By giving a model a javelin means that model then has a disadvantage, in the case of the Welsh this is a deduction to its shooting armour class. if a model has a two handed axe that gives a -1 to the enemies armour, it also gives a -1 to the user. Having a bow reduces a models armour etc etc. Models of different factions do not necessarily incur the same disadvantage as another faction though.

As a rule of thumb, weapons do not change any models stats (except the Xbows as explained in the rules dealing with ranged weapons, and the dane axes / horses in the relevant rules).

In the case of Athelstan, the fact that we used the term of "Welsh" subjects might have been misleading. They do not suffer any penalty for their javelins. This is one of the advantages of fielding a mighty Hero of the Viking Age.

In the factions description/Heroes of the Viking Age rules, we ensure that any drawback/penalty is clearly stated and written in black and white. So no need to extrapolate any penalty if it doesn't appear in the rules even if some "fluffy" reasons we use termans, names and words that could be actually misleading.

But we learn, so next time we will also ensure to highlight the lack of penalties when required

Hope this helps.

Thanks for clearing that up... although that is going to make facing Athelstan an absolute nightmare!

Mark