Dwarf Shard

Last game, a situation with the Dwarves came up. On the Dwarves’ turn, they had 2 Heroes go OOA. And on the next player’s turn, the Dwarves’ lost the rest of the Heroes to OOA. They all survived at the end, (Dwarf players stop crying, they all went down fighting). Here comes the question. Dwarves get an extra shard during the exploration phase, since the dwarves didn’t have any Heroes that didn’t go OOA, would they still get the free shard?



We discussed it and came to the conclusion that since the Shard is added during the exploration phase roll, and the Dwarves’ didn’t have any Heroes to roll for exploration that they didn’t get the extra shard either.



What’s your take on the situation?

I would say no.

Dwarves are overpowered enough as it is the don't need favors

Anybody else find the whole dwarves getting extra warpstone a bit ridiculous to begin with?

Thats not to say my reasoning is that I dont like dwarf warbands. With no one to look for warpstone, it doesnt matter how good they are at finding the stuff

I'm not so sure.

The exploration roll doesn't just represent the Heroes searching; it's the Heroes coordinating the whole warband, so the rule could represent the Dwarf Henchmen being a little more motivated to find treasure than other races and it's them who find the extra shard.

Please keep in mind though - my only experience of playing against Dwarfs was years ago when Nethrag used them during the Nemesis Crown campaign (and he wins all his games with any army / warband!)... But The Beanbag is just about to start using them in our Bell, Book and Candle campaign so my experience against them is about to get a refresher.

well warboss is right... the heroes get the warband to seacrh and they co-ordinate them (wow what a big word) but if ALL his heroes went ooa then i have reason to beleive he gets 1 shard due to the rule... i think

I feel the rule is clear enought

Code:

When checking for wyrdstone at the end of a
game, add +1 to the number of pieces found for a
Dwarf warband

so as u got no Heros left to search u wouldnt check for wyrdstone at all. In conclusion without checking the is no bounus.

Hmmm. Yeah, I have to agree if that's what it says.

Ah well, like Dmig said - they get other advantages!

The special rule says: "Dwarfs spend much of their lives
underground searching for precious minerals, and they are
the best in the world at this kind of work. In the city of
Mordheim they apply similar skills to the search for
wyrdstone. When checking for wyrdstone at the end of a
game, add +1 to the number of pieces found for a dwarf warband".

Which is ambiguous enough it could go either way. If the intent of the last sentence was "When the Dwarves are checking..." then there would be no extra shard with all of the Dwarf heroes out of action. If the intent was "When the warbands [or players] are checking..." then the dwarves would receive the shard.

My inclination would be to say, if the dwarves had a rough enough game they lost all of their heroes, letting them have a single shard is quite reasonable!

All went OOA thus they could not represents the warbands efforts.


The problem is they didn't really check. As per the rules below:
Roll a D6 for each Hero in your warband who survives
without going out of action. This represents the
warband’s efforts to unearth wyrdstone. Do not roll
for any Heroes who went out of action during the
battle; they are taken back to the warband’s
encampment to recuperate instead. So, for example,
if your warband includes four Heroes who all survived
the last battle, you can roll four dice. If you won your
last game, you may roll one extra dice. Add the results
of the dice together and consult the Exploration chart
to see how many shards of wyrdstone your warband
has found.

Do not roll for Henchmen. This does not mean that
they don’t search the ruins, but instead represents the
efforts of the Heroes in coordinating the search
parties. In addition, some Henchmen like Zombies or
Warhounds (for obvious reasons) are not particularly

useful when it comes to looking for wyrdstone.

This one can go either way as written. Since it is a "special" rule for the dwarfs I would say that they get 1 piece.

Wow, I never would have picked dwarfs as an overpowered warband. Of course, everyone's experiences with each warband are going to be different.

mweaver wrote:

The special rule says: "Dwarfs spend much of their lives
underground searching for precious minerals, and they are
the best in the world at this kind of work. In the city of
Mordheim they apply similar skills to the search for
wyrdstone. When checking for wyrdstone at the end of a
game, add +1 to the number of pieces found for a dwarf warband".

To me, this part is the kicker. Even if all dwarf heroes went OOA, then they found 0 + 1 shards of wyrdstone.

Furthermore, the warband listing states "All dwarfs are subject to the following special rules" so it logically follows that Incomparable Miners applies to henchmen, and is in effect as long as there's anyone to search the ruins.

There was kind of a lengthy discussion on this topic not that long ago, here.

Plus, from a storyline point of view, the dwarf henchmen would probably be more diligent about searching for loot than the two slayers.

I would say they find none. As the rule says you have to search for the wyrdstone to find the extra one.

"When checking for wyrdstone at the end of a
game, add +1 to the number of pieces found for a dwarf warband".

No checking for wyrdstone, no finding that extra one if you ask me.

Fluff-wise, if your heroes go OOA then your henchies are left leaderless and caring for their own Heroes comes before exploring on the 'things to do' list.

Agreed.

To further put a fine point on this, it states that the +1 is in addition to "the number of pieces found". No matter what your exploration roll comes out to be, you will always find at least 1, hence therefore adding an additional shard to that total. If you can't search, and therefore can't FIND any, you're not in possession of a "number of pieces found" to add anything to...

It's kind of like multiplying by 0...no matter how big the multiplier is, you still wind up with 0.

whisper2053 wrote:

To further put a fine point on this, it states that the +1 is in addition to "the number of pieces found".

Why can't the initial number of pieces found be 0?

whisper2053 wrote:

It's kind of like multiplying by 0...no matter how big the multiplier is, you still wind up with 0.

Except the bonus is to add one shard, and adding 1 to 0 still gets you 1 in the end.

What if all heroes went OOA, but the warband won the battle? Would they still get their bonus die for winning in the exploration phase? The rules don't say otherwise. The rules also don't say that you need standing heroes to conduct a search for wyrdstone.

Furthermore, the rulebook flat-out states that henchmen do participate in searching for wyrdstone, only that their efforts aren't sufficient to find any without some added help (hence why henchmen don't contribute dice to the search). Normally this is in the form of the heroes guiding their search, but if they won the battle then they'd have more time to scour the field. In the case of dwarfs, their expertise in treasure hunting comes into play, as the rule applies to ALL dwarfs, not just the leaders.

If we were to get really nit-picky with the rules, then having no heroes standing at the end of the battle doesn't mean that there is no exploration phase, it simply means that you don't get to roll any dice for heroes in the exploration phase. You can, however, still cash in on any other special skills that allow you to make income.

I agree with Myntokk as this is not multiplying so your mathmatical analysis is not correct as it says to "add" not multiply. It states +1 to whatever you find. So if you found zero but then add +1 for the special rule then that gives you 1 shard. This is normal mathmatics.

This is a benefit afforded to the dwarfs and it make sense.

Whisper: "If you can't search, and therefore can't FIND any, you're not in possession of a 'number of pieces found' to add anything to..."

Yes you are, because zero is a number.

I think the bottom line is that you can't prove the argument one way or the other. The arguments on both sides seem pretty reasonable to me, although I lean on the side of them finding a shard. Each group that has dwarves in its campaign should simply agree to what they see as fair. To be honest, I don't ever remember seeing it come up in practice.

Fair enough, it just seemed to me that it was an addition to something you already had to have by the wording.

As for my multiplication thing...I never said it was the same thing, just similar in theory. If you don't have something and rules state you need something in order to add more, then I fail to see where zero counts for that something you need. If you win the battle then sure, you get your die for winning (assuming all the heroes went out of action). Also I'd see you getting the extra +1 since you would at that point be eligible for at least a minimum of 1 base shard from a roll.

And yes, henchmen contribute, though as was previously stated by Myntokk "their efforts aren't sufficient to find any without some added help". If all the heroes are ooa (and therefore not searching)...they're no help and their contributions shouldn't really count for much unless you won and then their contribution can be found in the solitary extra die you get.

Just my two cents guys