In this week’s special guest edition of Ruleshammer, PlasticCraic is filling in for Rob “Vre’kais” Chilton and walking us through how the “Might Makes Rightier” rule in Age of Sigmar works. It’s not a new rule, but it is something that players still get wrong from time to time.
Let’s take a moment to run through the mess that is the Mightier Makes Rightier rule from Battletome: Sons of Behemat.
This is one that I’ve seen come up a lot: people seem to have a vague awareness that there’s something janky about the rule, but they aren’t clear on the specifics. I’m here today to explain to you why the current rule is literally game-breaking.
Hopefully this will serve as a resource for people unclear on the interaction, or better still, nudge GW into fixing the rule in the next FAQ update. (Editor’s Note: Good luck on that one, buddy)
The Rules
Let’s start out by defining our terms. Here’s the Mightier Makes Rightier rule itself:
Mightier Makes Rightier
When determining control of an objective, each friendly MANCRUSHER GARGANT model counts as 10 models instead of 1, and each friendly MEGA-GARGANT counts as 20 models instead of 1.
Designer’s Note: If the battleplan being played does not follow the normal rules for controlling objectives, you can pick whether to use this battle trait or to follow the rules from the battleplan each time control of the objective is determined.
And here’s the relevant Designer’s Commentary:
Q: The designer’s note on ‘Mightier Makes Rightier’ states that in battleplans that do not follow the normal rules for controlling objectives, you can pick whether to use the battle trait or to follow the rules from the battleplan. Does this mean, for example, in ‘Battleplan: Places of Arcane Power’, I could choose to contest an objective with a friendly Mancrusher unit even though it does not have the Leader battlefield role? A: Yes.
Hmmm.
So What’s The Issue?
The issue is that the timing for capturing objectives on Places of Arcane Power has its own special little window. And this is where the whole thing falls over:
HEROIC CONQUEST
The normal rules for controlling an objective are not used in this battle. Instead, a player controls an objective if a Leader unit from their army finishes a move within 3″ of the objective, unless that move was a retreat move. The player loses control of that objective if that Leader unit is not within 3″ of it or is destroyed.
Only 1 Leader unit can control each objective at a time – if more than 1 unit is eligible, then the first to arrive controls it. If an enemy unit controlling an objective is destroyed by an attack made with a melee weapon by a Leader unit, then the attacking unit immediately gains control of that objective, as long as they are within 3″ of it.
The interaction with the final clause in the original Battletome Designer’s Note is the core problem: “each time control of the objective is determined.” This specific mission gives you a window to determine control during each player’s turn (when they move), rather than at the end of the turn as per the Core Rules.
So how this plays out in practice is that you’re playing against Sons, and you move your Leader within 3″ of the objective. He’s the first model there to claim it. Good.
Regardless of which phase we are in (whether you’ve moved in the Hero phase, Movement phase, charged or piled in), control of the objective is now being determined.
The Sons player vetoes that. They use their Mightier Makes Rightier ability to say no, actually, we’re not doing that. We’re not using the rules from the Battleplan, we’re just going to do normal capturing and count models at the end of the turn.
So then the end of the turn comes around, and you cap it normally with your Leader model who is still standing there, right?
Nope… still no.
“You can pick…each time control of the objective is determined”. They flip the scoring to classic “end of turn” when you move onto it; they flip back to “moving Leaders” when it gets to the end of the turn, and your movement window has already been and gone.
Heads they win, tails you lose.
WTF?! Isn’t That A Bit Daft?
Yes, it’s utterly ridiculous. It’s literally game-breaking.
Well What Are We Going To Do About It?
So there you have it. If I bring SOB on Three Places, you can’t possibly get a Major Victory. I don’t care how good a player you think you are, it literally can’t be done. The absolute best case you can hope for, if you table me at the top of turn 1, is a 0-0 tie on VPs; as soon as I score one single VP on one single objective, you’re screwed.
Given that GW still haven’t fixed the Runic Fyrewall (don’t get me started on that thing), and took Gork-knows-how-long to correct the everlasting Emergency Ventplates (even though I know for a fact that this was raised to their attention on multiple occasions), my faith is slender that we will see a timely resolution. This nonsense has already survived the 2020 Winter FAQ.
My own suggestion would be leaving this Battleplan out of tournament packs unless and until GW fixes the interaction. It’s not really fair on SOB players to expect them to deliberately choose not to win the game, especially if they’re facing one of their (many, many, many) bad matchups that will otherwise just shoot them off the table.
It’s not a mission that sees much play here in Australia, so it’s just a theoretical problem from my own selfish viewpoint, but I know it sometimes makes its way into tournament packs overseas.
In which case, you have my sympathies.
Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. And if you want to read more from PlasticCraic about the Age of Sigmar, check out their personal blog on the topic.
