Master of Blades with Swords?

The skill in question is this:

Master of Blades: This Dwarf’s martial skills surpass those of a normal warrior; he has fought unscathed against hordes of Orcs and Goblins. When using a weapon that has a Parry special rule, this hero parries successfully if he beats or matches his opponents highest ‘to hit’ roll, not just if he beats the roll. In addition, if this warrior is using two weapons that have the Parry special rule, he is allowed to parry two attacks (if his two dice match or beat the two highest Attack dice against him) instead of the normal maximum of one. Note that if this Dwarf has two Dwarf axes (as detailed above) he can re-roll any failed parries.

It says "If this warrior is using two weapons that have the Parry special rule, he is allowed to parry two attacks"

That would apply to Swords as well.

Then there's a note: "[T]hat if this Dwarf has two Dwarf axes (...) he can re-roll any failed parries."

We've made a house rule saying that two Swords = re-roll parry. So for us, this skill would apply to Swords as well, right?

I know - that's for us to decide, but logically wouldn't it make sense? (My brain is fried atm. ^_^)

Um, not going RAW by your rules, but why would you want to use swords if you could use Dwarf Axes with Master of Blades? Or do you have another house-rules that says anyone can get master of blades or something?

Good question, which you should ask my roomie about
Refering to another question of mine (LGT Equipment List), we've had some Thunderers with Dwarf Axes, which they cannot use and cannot get, since he hasn't picked Combat Skill Table for them. We agreed that all cases of a 'wrong Lad's Hero' could be altered, however, even though we allowed to change skill lists, all increases had to be re-rolled as well. He got Master of Blades with some of those Thunderers, and their increases we're very good, so he chose not to change them and asked whether Swords would benefit in the same way. I don't see the problem due to our house rules, even though I don't understand why he won't re-roll it ^_^

Oh, I see. Well, yeah, if you house-rule it to work then it will work, but by RAW it wouldn't. Still, since the disbanding of the Games Police many years ago you won't have to worry about the penalties of getting caught having unauthorised fun.

As it happens, I am often a fan of cross-training TLGT heroes. In the case of dwarfs then certainly their CC henchmen make the better snipers and their thunderers make the better melee heroes. E.G. if you get a Clansman hero and pick Shooting as one of his skill lists and then give him the skill that lets him use all shooting weapons you have a dwarf that can use sniper rifles, warplock pistols, crossbow pistols, etc. *and* can use dwarf axes. Conversely if you make your Thunderer a melee expert you end up with a dwarf that can use all melee weapons in the game *and* can carry a crossbow and/or handgun.

Oh, just-by-the-by, we use an interpretation of the skill lists that allows henchmen access to their chosen two tables *and* the racial table. It seems to lead to more fun for everyone.

Haha, glad to hear that ;-)

Well, the main reason I'm asking is probably, that I think it's a shame to use Swords on Dwarves. Might be I'm just too conservative, but I just don't see it as fitting them. Same goes with Spears, but since I was the first in our group to use them with Dwarves, I can't really argue against them.

And yes, definitely! Our group is just too happy with the Strength table, that I don't think we have any Lad's Hero without it (if he's able to take it) - atleast with Saurus, Dwarves, Beastmen and Orcseses! The 'crit immunity' against most henchmen is just hard to let go off! Of course it would still be possible with Shooting/Strength for a Clansman or Combat/Strength for a Thunderer, but then you'd lose out on the Special table. With your house rule, that would eliminate that problem though.
As a question to that, what do you do with warbands without Special lists? I suppose they still only get to chose two tables, if it's a rule interpretation?

Yup, if the warband doesn't have a special table then their heroes only get the two tables they chose when they became heroes. It should be noted that even with this house rule human mercenaries are still quite popular.

We find that in practice, any given hero will tend to only take one or two of the racial skills anyway and allowing access to the racial skills makes things a bit more flavourful.

It should also be noted that we use the interpretation that when they choose the skill tables they can choose *any* of the basic table, not just skills that someone in the warband already has access to. For example, we allow a Beastman TLGT hero to choose shooting skills or a Marienburger hero to choose Strength skills (or a dwarf to select speed skills).

Remember that skirmish combat has different mechanics to formation combat so they may well prefer different weapons. Also, the Mordheim dwarfs are those that are exiled, possibly for the very willingness to use different weapons and tactics that are shown on the list.

The only issue I can see here is that re-rolling parries with two swords would complete negate a buckler's use, wouldn't it?

Otherwise, you and your lads play how you can all agree on!

Very interesting - then I could use my Beastmen bows from the Ungor box! ^_^

Figgy, we still use bucklers quite a lot actually, but combined with spears instead. So we still get to use them! Our offhands has -2 to hit anyway, so the extra 5gc is fair enough we think :-)

Oh, the -2 to hit is a pretty nice way to balance that I suppose! I have a slightly different set of house rules, but that sounds like it'd be balanced enough!

Well, I've calculated quite a lot with different Hit Chances, Strength vs. Toughness, Attacks and the most common weapons, and the -2 to hit was more balanced compared to -1 to hit with both weapons or off-hand weapon only, where the minus to both was very bad with a lot of attacks (obviously) and the -1 to off-hand simply wasn't enough, making two hand weapons better still.
Of course it still depends on the opponent, but with various combinations, the -2 came off as the most balanced overall.

So, it seems that I found some more information concerning this topic:

Dwarf Axe Parry Special Rule wrote:

A model may not parry more than one attack in a single Close Combat phase; a model armed with two Dwarf axes (or a Dwarf axe and a sword, etc) does not get to parry two attacks but may instead re-roll a failed parry.

Master of Blades Special Rule wrote:

Master of Blades: This Dwarf’s martial skills surpass those of a normal warrior; he has fought unscathed against hordes of Orcs and Goblins. When using a weapon that has a Parry special rule, this hero parries successfully if he beats or matches his opponents highest ‘to hit’ roll, not just if he beats the roll. In addition, if this warrior is using two weapons that have the Parry special rule, he is allowed to parry two attacks (if his two dice match or beat the two highest Attack dice against him) instead of the normal maximum of one. Note that if this Dwarf has two Dwarf axes (as detailed above) he can re-roll any failed parries.

So, first of all:
Dwarf Axe + Sword = 1 Parry that may be re-rolled
Dwarf Axe + Dwarf Axe = 1 Parry that may be re-rolled

So far so good. Then we implement the Master of Blades skill:
Sword + Sword = 2 Parries
Dwarf Axe + Dwarf Axe = 2 Parries that may be re-rolled
Dwarf Axe + Sword = 2 Parries, one which may be re-rolled?

I must admit I am a bit confused why there's a difference between Dwarf Axes and Swords, when they both have a parry rule (in our house rules, as mentioned earlier, 2 Swords allow a parry re-roll), which should basically do the same with Master of Blades (hey, you're a master?!) - why not?

As with any roll involving more than one type of rule, the use of a different color of dice would tell you which one is the Dwarf axe.

Otherwise its your house rule and I am inclined to let you figure it out.

Von Kurst wrote:

Otherwise its your house rule and I am inclined to let you figure it out.

Why are you always so mean?!?!

Well, guess we'll just keep them as they are. Swords may re-roll parries as well with Master of Blades, which is a set 5+ parry.

I had gotten a bit confused.


So a Dwarf who is baster of blades, armed with 2 Dwarf axes can try to parry twice the first attackers hits with one re-roll per each parry attempts? Or he can try to parry the first to attacker attacks?


What if the first attacker charge the aforesaid Dwarf whit Mighty Blows from a successful diving charge (or whit other means) and making attacks whit twice of the dwarf strength? Does he lose all of his chance to parry? what if our poor dwarf is charged by two enemy warriors who he can not parry due to their strengths? If he survived them is he allowed to parry a third opponent?

Not sure how much of this is RAW and how much of it is house-rules, but here goes...

Each parry must target a different attack - you cannot make two separate parry attempts on the same attack.

The Parry rule says that hits that are double your strength may not be parried, but for hits that are 6's it says you lose the chance to parry. In my group we interpreted this to mean that if you are attacked by multiple opponents and some of them are too strong to parry you may still parry the first attack(s) that you are able to parry. This interpretation doesn't seem to have made things less fun.

And then the rulebook says:

"If a model is fighting against several opponents, it may only parry the strike from the enemy who makes the first hit(s) (ie, the attacking model with the highest Initiative)."

And there are the cases when you gain an extra attack or make several hits whit the same attack (like rapier, or double barreled pistol). In the two weapon fighting rule it says to "Roll to hit and wound for each weapon separately". Does it count as a second strike?.

Mordheim Rulebook wrote:

"If a model is fighting against several opponents, it may only parry the strike from the enemy who makes the first hit(s) (ie, the attacking model with the highest Initiative)."

In my group we ignore the 'clarification' because it self-evidently isn't one. Personally, I suspect they intended to type 'e.g.' rather than 'i.e.'; the two are often confused, but have quite different meanings. Anyway, the point is we allow someone with parry to parry the first hit that actually happens, whether that is from the first, second, or any subsequent attacker.

Because the rules for Parry were written before anyone *could* make two parries we house-ruled that the second parry must be used against the second attack that happens, whether that is from the first, second, or any subsequent attacker.

Multiple attack weapons are treated on a case-by-case basis because they have different mechanics, but, basically we just go with the 'attempt to parry the hits as they occur' guideline. For the two specific examples you mention:
1/ Rapier: Yes, if the attacker scores only one hit and then makes a second attack as per the barrage rules the second attack may be parried if it hits.
2/ Double-barrelled pistol: The pistol rolls one dice that, if it hits, generates two hits. If this first dice-roll is parried then *both* pistol hits are missed.
3/ Dual-wielding: Absolutely, if the on-hand weapon scores 1 hit and the off-hand weapon scores 1 hit they may both be parried.