Warhammer Fantasy Battle Reporter Forum

I have been reading the rule book (again), and a question has arisen.

Sometimes going second can be an advantage (especially if you have deployed deep, out of shooting range etc).

The rules for rolling who goes first says "may add +1 to their dice roll". The key word here is may.

Do you have to add +1 to your roll?
How do you guys play this rule?

Also playing a bit of mind games! What would your thoughts be if an opponent choose not to add +1 ?

If your opponent finished deploying before you then add +1 to your dice roll. If you win you can still choose to go second. It's the same as if there is a "can" in the statement, you can argue either way but with a +1 you are more likely to win the starting roll and can choose to go second. I did so in my last battle and got a Solid Victory out of it.

It also depends on the army, Bretonnians pretty much always go second because of praying to the lady. The Slayer Army usually wants to go first to get into combat with one less round of shooting/maic against them.

I alost ALWAYS go second. Even shooty armies will have trouble to hit a lot that first round (But I play Skaven, so I can take that beating a lot better than other armies). The added advantage is that you will have last turn, where you can dish out where you can and cannot score any extra points - do you really want to charge that unit, as the chance it ends in a stale mate is high? Maybe you could better NOT charge, and move into position to claim or deny table quarters. etc, etc.

But like engineer said: just add the +1 on your roll: if you win YOU get to decide who goes first!

I would have thought that it was an advantage to go first if you have a ranged weapon army and you're fighting another ranged weapon army. You might be able to take out an enemy artillery piece before it takes out one of yours.

If I am facing a non-shooting army or someone with lots of flyers and fast cavalry then I like to go first. It means that my Quarrellers and Warmachines can put a dent into the units most likely to get into melee range of my army early. Also gives my Gyrocopter time to fly forward and march block the more annoying enemy units. This is the primary reason I ALWAYS take Quarrellers over Thunderers in my Dwarf army

That said there are also occassions if I have castled up and am playing defensively that I give my opponent the first turn to see what he is going to do... just not very often... I think I have gone first in at least 90% of my games.

With High Elves however I often go 2nd as I take a more movement orientated approach to using them, consequently it makes more sense to have the enemy go first and commit themselves to something before you move yourself

i play orcs and i always go first and call the whaah! ( is that how it is spelt ) sometimes i ask the opponant ( my brother ) whether if he won the die if he would let me go first anyway

i always let my opent go first as high elves, mainly becasue he plays DE and always moves full distance 10" for infanctry and 14" for cavelry, them means that come my tern they are in range to be charged by my knight straight out (16" DPs + 10" from DE warriors = 26 i believe ths is correct) so long as he deploys as far foward as he can i get to decimate him right up.

My usual opponent and I don't bother with the set up rules in the book. We actually take it in turns to deploy our units (one by one !) and then roll a dice, highest goes first.

me and my friends set up in a race and winner gets +1