Questions RE: steel whips and lucky charms

I've got two questions I'm hoping you all can help me out with.

1. Steel whips get an extra attack when charged or charging. If the model with the whip is already engaged in melee combat and is charged by another model, do they still get a counter attack with the whip?

2. How do lucky charms work with henchmen groups? Do I need one charm per member of the group or do I buy a charm for the entire group? is it only the first model that gets the save or do all models get one save assuming I have enough charms for the whole group?

1/ They get a special 'whipcrack' attack that will strike first against the charger. Other attacks will be worked out normally. Note that a single model cannot stun or knock down a model and then take advantage of the model being stunned or knocked down - they will still have to roll to hit and to wound as normal. Any other model can take advantage of the enemy being kd or stunned, of course .

2/ Henchmen groups can't have equipment so they can't have a lucky charm in the first place. If you are house-ruling that they can then they would probably have to follow the same rules for weapons and they will all need the equipment, be it lucky charm or anything else.

Oh hey, I completely forgot about henchmen not being able to use those items. Hired swords would count as henchmen here right? So i couldn't put a lucky charm on my Elven Ranger

From memory there is a different rule that says you can't give or remove any weapons or equipment at all to a hired sword.

I vaguely remember in my circle we house-ruled something that if they lost any of their weapons or equipment they would replace it out of their own purse (e.g. swordbreaker).

Looks like you're right, found this in the rules
"Special characters have their own equipment. Only
they may use this equipment; it can’t be given to
other warriors. Furthermore, you cannot buy
extra weapons or equipment for a special
character."

thanks for the info!

Whoops, that was Dramatis Personae, this is hired swords

"A player cannot buy extra weapons or
equipment for a Hired Sword, and he
cannot sell the Hired Sword’s weapons
or equipment."

Yes. It's very sad. If I have a HS I like, I would love to be able to buy him a charm or bunny foot, but it is not to be.

Yeah. I'd love to be able to buy Winter Furs and Rain Coats for HS in our Border Town Burning campaign.